Where is Your Strength
Last week we spoke about remembering your priorities. As you listed those and placed them in an order that makes sense, I would like to refer back to my own.
As you may remember, I listed God as my first priority. So, what does that mean? And you may be asking, “Bonnie, are you trying to proselytize me?”
My first response is, I can barely spell the word proselytize so no, that is not my intent. But my serious response is this: my relationship with God is what keeps me sane and focused. Recently, I was having lunch with a doctor friend. I absolutely loved her explanation of how to deal with COVID. She said “on the one hand we have COVID, and as health care providers, we take on a certain level of risk. We have to go to work. At the same time, we have to use our scientific brains and wear a mask and do all the things we know make sense. HOWEVER, as Christians, we also have faith. And faith does not grow stronger without trials.”
Faith and trials go hand-in-hand almost like cause and effect. Now before someone says, “Bonnie said COVID came from God,” let me clarify exactly what I am saying and I assure you, that is not it.
If any of you are like me, you have basically had your “hair on fire” at least five and sometimes six or even seven days per week. You work(ed) 8 – 12 or more hours per day only to rush home and fix/eat dinner. Many times, that “meal” was had standing at the counter or on your way home from work from a fast food or takeout restaurant. We didn’t have time to cook, let alone sit down to eat. You quickly straightened up the kitchen while you prepared for bed and planned for the next day.
I’m guessing many of your days have changed. The kids cannot go to school, so everyone is in the house. You actually have time to cook AND eat at home sitting at that table in the dining room… that room that had almost become a foreign land. You may even go out together (with masks of course) on the weekend for a social distancing activity. Our friends took their middle and high school kids to two different safaris to get everyone out of the house. When was the last time you could do a family activity instead of running from practice-to-practice for each child?
So, what does that have to do with strength? I have been reminded more times than I can count, that my strength does not come from my job, or my wonderful husband, or monetary things. Even my ability to now reconnect with my family comes straight is a gift from relationship with God. And, for those of you who grew up in Sunday School or Vacation Bible School or catechism or any variety of spiritual schooling, you may have memorized Psalm 121:1-2. “I look up to the hills, but were will my help really come from? My help will come from the Lord, the Creator of heaven and earth.” ERV
Neither you nor I can claim to be people of faith, then “give in and give up” when the playing field of life becomes strewn with potholes and unexpected turns. Let’s join together, encourage one other, and look up to the One from where our strength comes.
Next time, we will go a bit deeper into the topic of “Getting Difficult News.”
As always, please reach out if there is anything I can do to help you in your leadership journey.
