Month: July 2016

Suffering My Thorn

/ Liz Herod / Leave a comment

To be honest, I haven’t been feeling much like myself lately. I’m falling back into a depressive slump, and I don’t like it, but I don’t know what to do to fix it. Of course, I don’t have to know. Why? Because me knowing is all about “me, me, me” when it’s not about me at all; I should be focused on “Him, Him, Him.” That’s my problem when I start stumbling. I focus on my feeling helpless, my feeling lost, and my inability to quell this monster on my own. The thing is it’s not my battle to win! If I try to destroy my depression and anxiety on my own, I will lose every time. I need to give it to Him.

2 Corinthians 12:7-10 says,

“. . . So to keep me from becoming proud, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger from Satan to torment me and keep me from becoming proud.

“Three different times I begged the Lord to take it away. Each time He said, ‘My grace is all you need. My power works best in weakness.’ So now I am glad to boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ can work through me. That’s why I take pleasure in my weaknesses, and in the insults, hardships, persecutions, and troubles that I suffer for Christ. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”

My depression, my anxiety – they are my thorn. I have cried out to God over and over again to remove them from me, but He refuses. He keeps sending me these verses instead, and so I will boast of this thorn in my side and use it to serve God’s glory. Through my weakness, He makes me strong. I place my trust in His will and His hand in my life, on my mind, and on my body.

“Even though the fig trees have no blossoms,
And there are no grapes on the vines;
Even though the olive crop fails,
And the fields lie empty and barren;
Even though the flocks dies in the fields,
And the cattle barns are empty,
Yet I will rejoice the LORD!
I will be joyful in the God of my salvation!
The Sovereign Lord is my strength!
He makes me as surefooted as a deer,
Able to tread upon the heights.”

Habakkuk 3:17-19

No matter what seems to be going wrong, I will rejoice in the Lord my God and trust His path for my life. The road my not be easy, but I know it will be worth taking, even with all the valleys I must walk through. The darkness will not claim my life but give me a testimony to bring others to the Light.

“Though the sorrows my last for the night, joy comes sin the morning.”

Psalm 30:5b

Who can know how long the night will last, but the morning will come.

I suffer this thorn in my side, for I know that I am trading my sorrow for joy, my weakness for strength, my pain for comfort, and my past for my salvation – and each of you can do the same. Your thorn may be different from mine. Your story certainly is, but God can use your testimony to serve Him, if you let Him.

Don’t be ashamed of your journey; share it! Someone needs your story.

God bless!

Elizabeth

A Renewed Spirit and A Revived Dedication

/ Liz Herod / Leave a comment

Okay, I recognize that I have been seriously neglecting this blog. As you read on, you’ll see that God’s been dealing with me about just that.

We get scared. We doubt – regularly. We get busy and get too focused on the craziness of our lives that we lose track of our lives with God, and we make countless excuses: “I have to get this paper done before I do anything else;” “I have too much to read; I’ll do it later;” I don’t have time to do it right now;” “Can’t afford to do fun stuff, yet;” etc.

The problem is we never do it later. There is always something else that needs to get done, some important task that we think is more important at the time than a conversation. Boy, are we wrong! There is nothing more important than our relationship with God. No matter what is going on or how busy we are, we need to set aside plenty of time to build and maintain our relationship because without it everything will fall apart, and we rarely recognize the cause of our troubles.

I am the poster child of this issue. I constantly get caught up with everything else in my life, especially school, and forget to – or just don’t – take the time to focus on God and spend time with Him. Inevitably, my world starts falling apart before too long.

Until the last few weeks, I was still struggling to keep myself focused on my Father. I thought summer would be easier to refocus without classes, but that hasn’t been the case, so I’m challenging myself to write every day and to post a blog at least once a week. God doesn’t expect perfection. (Someone, please, keep reminding me of that.) He wants all of us: the good, the bad, AND the ugly. He knows everything about us and loves us anyway, so why do we act like He doesn’t want what we have to give, even if it’s not all that we probably should? God understands baby steps! Give Him what you can now, and more will come later. This is one piece of advice that I really need to remember and act on myself.

Here’s to renewal!

God bless!

Elizabeth

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