The Hard Things

The hard things, aren’t there just so many of them?  This last week I had to do one of those really hard things.  I had to load up my four beautiful babies in our van.  They were all crying, really it was more like an uncontrollable sob.  There little hearts were so sad.  As we drove away looking back at their daddy crying and waving, knowing it would be months before we would see him again.  My heart was breaking for them, for me, and for what felt like the world.  I wanted to turn around and take them back.  I wanted to ease their pain and make life all better.   But I couldn’t.

“Through the Lord’s mercies we are not consumed, because His compassions fail not.  They are new every morning; Great is Your faithfulness.  “The Lord is my portion,” says my soul, “Therefore I hope in Him!”  The Lord is good to those who wait for Him, to the soul who seeks Him.  It is good that one should hope and wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord.”  Lamentations 3:22-26

I couldn’t take them back because sometimes God asks us to do the hard things.  And reacting to that emotion to make things better for the moment, as heavy as it was weighing on me, would have done two things: It would have been an only for the moment “feel better,” and I would have been disobeying God. 

When God gives us direction sometimes it may seem unfair or hurtful to our kids. Remember that He loves them more than we do and that if God has given us a clear direction it benefits every life it touches including our children’s.  

“For the Lord will not cast off forever.  Though He causes grief, yet He will show compassion according to the multitude of His mercies.  For He does not afflict willingly, nor grieve the children of men.”  Lamentations 3:31-33

“For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future.”   Jeremiah 29:11

Whether it is in discipline, a big life change like a move or a new job, a financial cut back.  Where ever it maybe that God is leading you.  Follow Him with all your heart. Focus on Him.  Listen to Him and mute out the world around you.  Seek wise counsel.  He will never call you to do anything that will harm your children. 

Lord, give me the strength to do your will in the hard things.  I wish life could be all flowers and sunshine but that is impossible in our world so polluted with sin.  Keep my feet upon your path always.  Do not let me veer to the left or to the right.  Give me a heart with eyes that are fixed on You.  Give me a vision to see where you are leading me and the patient endurance to withstand the valleys and the fires along the way.  Give me a trust and faith in You that can take a step at a time knowing that Your plans are to give me a “hope and a future.”  And help me never to forget that You Lord have entrusted me with these little children, that You created them in love and that Your plan is always best for every life that it touches.