Sometimes we get stuck. It’s not that we plan to be pinched between problems, but sometimes we are. When stuck it’s hard to see out of the confines of our own little hole, our own narrowed thinking or our box of self. We often get negative. When we get negative it affects every single thing in our lives…each relationship and each choice.
I am a cheerleader by nature and I am constantly encouraging women to Live Up. But, I’ve been thinking….to live up, is not easy. Why? Because the upward gaze of looking up to God in everything goes against the grain of what my normal pattern dictates. I am used to looking in and looking out.
When I look in, I am aware of my feelings, my hurt and my pain. When I look out, I am aware of how others have disappointed me or how others have more than I do. Looking in and looking out, keep me from looking up. And, when not looking up I tend to go about living within my emotional self, or living outside of faith and entrenched in my problems.
What are we to do when real life pinches the faith life out of us?
We are taught in Scripture to set our minds and set our hearts upward.
Col 3:1-2
“Since then you ahve been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right had of God. Set your minds on things avove, not on earthly things.”
from The Message
“Don’t shuffle along eyes to the ground, absorbed with the things right in front of you. Look up, and be alert to what is going on around Chrit, that’s where the action is. See things from his perspective.”
Ouch….See things from his perspective? That is the problem. When I am pinched between problems, I look in and feel sorry for myself, or look out and blame the circumstance on something or someone around me.
It is my prayer that we all learn what it means to set our hearts and minds in a different direction. It is a decision, a choice and an action step to “set” something in place.
Father, teach us how to set our hearts and minds on you. Show us how to live differently by looking up. Teach us to give to you all things we find when looking in and looking out. Show us how to live as your children…loved and blessed by you. Amen
