How to Survive Tough Times

Limmited

Megan Breedlove January 13, 2014 No Comments

Yes, I know the title of this devotional is spelled wrong. But let me explain.

This past week, my third-grade son, Kenny, participated in a spelling bee at his school. He was one of two representatives chosen from his class for his superior spelling ability. The bee contestants were third-, fourth-, and fifth-graders, all of whom had to stand before a gym packed with their classmates and parents and try to spell their words correctly.

Kenny wasn’t completely prepared. He had lost his spelling list partway through the preparation time, and it took us awhile to get another one. So he had studied some of the words, but he wasn’t as fully prepared as he could have been.

“Please, God,” I prayed, as Kenny’s first turn approached. “Please let him get through at least one round.”

It wasn’t to be. Kenny got the word “limited” and spelled it with two “m’s”. For him, the spelling bee was over.

We had told him beforehand that whether he won or lost, we would still be proud of him. I was especially proud of his attitude after he lost. He was disappointed, but he accepted the results bravely. “I’m proud of you, son,” I said, giving him a hug.

And I was—though I couldn’t help but wonder whether more preparation would have made a difference in the outcome.

It’s a relatively minor thing not to be prepared for a spelling bee. It’s much more serious when you and I aren’t prepared for the tests that come our way in life—tests that we could have prepared for, if we had only done what we were supposed to do.

I’m not saying that there is a way to anticipate everything that might happen to us, just as there is no way to prepare for every single spelling word in the English language. But Scripture promises us that we will all face trials. And when we do, it’s best to be as ready as possible.

How do we get ready for trials? How can we possibly prepare when we don’t know exactly what’s coming? Three ways.

First, we maintain a close relationship with God. Just like any close relationship, this one involves spending time with the Person we want to be close to. We need to spend regular, daily time with Him. Some of the ways to do that include prayer, Bible study, and hearing His Word proclaimed. When we encounter a trial, we don’t want to have to try to remember where we last left God, so to speak. We want to be close to Him and used to communing with Him on a regular basis.

Second, we take care of our relationships with others. During times of trial, we will need others to be close to us, to help us make it through. If we’ve allowed our relationships with family and friends to grow distant, then when hardship comes, we’ll be scrambling for support. If we are holding something against someone—or if he or she is holding something against us—we need to get that settled. Not during the midst of a trial, but right now, before the trial comes.

Third, we need to take care of our bodies. As much as possible, we need to eat well and get enough sleep. I know these two things aren’t always possible. But when they are, we need to take advantage of them as ways to keep our body strong, so that when a trial hits, we won’t fold physically under the pressure.

We may not know exactly what’s coming, but we can prepare as if we did. That way, when trials come (not if), we’ll be better able to face them to God’s glory. And maybe, just maybe, we won’t be knocked out in the first round.

James 1:2—Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds. (ESV; italics added)

Dropping Crumbs

Megan Breedlove April 22, 2013 4 Comments

My youngest son Timmy loves to be played with physically. He loves to be spun, tossed, bounced, and flipped. The other day I was standing in the kitchen, and Timmy walked up to me wanting “up”. I picked him up and let him wrap his legs around my waist. Then I leaned him back into my arms and began swooshing him back and forth.

Timmy immediately began to giggle in that infectious way that makes everyone around him want to laugh too. His mouth dropped open, and crumbs from something-or-the-other he’d been eating fell out as he giggled. He was enjoying life and having a blast.

That’s the kind of enjoyment I want to get from life too. I don’t necessarily want my food to fall out of my mouth, but I want to enjoy life wholeheartedly, in a way that makes others want to join in.

Granted, there are some things in life that aren’t any fun. Timmy would acknowledge that. Getting told “no” doesn’t make him laugh. Neither does getting his nose sucked out with the bulb syringe. In fact, he cries. Screams, is more like it. And there will be times in our lives, too, when we wail in protest.

But the rest of the time…oh, the rest of the time, I want to laugh like crazy! I want to squeeze every bit of enjoyment out of life that I can. I don’t want to miss the moments of laughter because I’m too busy thinking about the unpleasant times; I don’t want to enjoy them any less because I’m so stressed out about the other stuff of life that I just don’t have it in me to laugh when “laugh time” comes around.

Even Jesus laughed. The Bible doesn’t say so specifically, but it does show examples of His enjoying life. Jesus was invited to a wedding, and He went. He was invited to more than one banquet, and He accepted the invitation. He embraced children. And these are only some of the examples.

The Bible doesn’t tell us Jesus ever enjoyed the warmth of the sun on a beautiful spring day, or the peacefulness of being out on the water on the Sea of Galilee. But He must have. He made those things! And if we, being human, enjoy them, how much more must He enjoy His own creation?

There must have been times He laughed till He cried. There must have been times, when He was a child, that He enjoyed His mother or father’s embrace. Maybe He even enjoyed playing with them in the same way I played with Timmy, giggling until everybody else joined in, crumbs falling from His lips.

Maybe you and I should take a lesson from Jesus. And from Timmy. Let’s deal with the unpleasant parts of life when they have to be dealt with. But when life brings out the giggles in us, let’s enjoy it to the fullest.

Psalm 118:24—This is the day the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it. (NIV)

The Motherhood Olympics

Megan Breedlove July 9, 2012 No Comments

I absolutely love the Olympics. I normally don’t watch much TV, but when the Olympics are on, I watch all day long. Doesn’t even matter what sport it is (though my favorite is gymnastics). Anything Olympics-related is simply awesome.

I love the sports aspect of it. I love the pageantry. I love the emotional highs and lows. I also love what a wonderful opportunity it is to teach my children. You can teach about everything from sports to geography, science to foreign languages to math. But the best lessons of all are about character.

From watching and discussing the Olympics, children can learn about diligence; endurance; being a good sport; how to deal with discouragement; how to act around people who are different from you; and how to determine what really matters in life (the answer’s not “being #1”).

Sounds like lessons we as moms need to learn, too, especially since we participate in our own kind of Olympics—the Motherhood Olympics.

In the Motherhood Olympics, there are some team sports and some individual sports. Each of us is enrolled in some events in each category. There are some things we must have the help of others to do; there are some where we’re largely on our own.

In either case, we have to train for our events. We need to work at being able to do well in motherhood. An Olympic athlete doesn’t win her event by accident. It takes training and endurance practiced over a period of years. Likewise, we moms won’t succeed at parenting by accident. We need to put effort into it. This should include, first of all, staying close to the Lord and seeking His wisdom. But it might also include things like reading books, listening to sermons, consulting others, being proactive, and making plans.

But there are two important differences between the Motherhood Olympics and the traditional Olympics. The first difference is that moms don’t pursue a gold medal; they pursue the goal of hearing Jesus say, “Well done.” And unlike the traditional Olympics, women in the Motherhood Olympics are guaranteed to win. Will they be perfect? No. But they can be faithful. In the traditional Olympics, perfection or near-perfection is what wins you the medal. In the Motherhood Olympics, what wins you Jesus’ approval is faithfulness.

The second important difference is that unlike the traditional Olympics, in the Motherhood Olympics, everyone can win. When you’re an Olympic gymnast, swimmer, or runner, it’s technically possible that someone else could share the gold medal with you. But it’s highly unlikely. Even if it does happen, the odds against more than two people sharing first place are astronomical (unless it’s a team sport).

In the Motherhood Olympics, however, billions of moms can win. That’s because, as we said earlier, all that’s required to win is faithfulness. Be faithful with the husband you are given (if you are married), the children you are given, and the resources you are given, and you will win.

It’s simple, though not easy. But then, training for an Olympic event never is. Yet you never hear an athlete standing atop the podium saying, “You know, this wasn’t worth all that work.” Hardly! They all say, “It was worth it…all the long hours…all the effort…all the exhaustion…the money…the pain….”

Likewise, you never hear a mom who receives Jesus’ approval say, “This isn’t worth it.” Instead, she says, “It was so worth it… all the long hours…all the effort…all the exhaustion…the money…the pain….”

You’re in the race, mom, like it or not. You are at the Olympics. The crowd—which consists of others who have gone before you, not to mention your precious family—is watching you. How will you run? Will you give it everything you’ve got?

I guarantee you that nothing is worth more than winning this one.

Hebrews 12:1—Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.

Not My Will

Megan Breedlove January 2, 2012 No Comments

I promised last time that we would look at what joy and victory in the midst of anguish look like, and we will. We’ll examine the best example the Bible gives us about Someone who went through incredible anguish and yet remained whole, even while His body was torn apart.

The scene takes place in a garden. Jesus and His disciples have come to this favorite location because Jesus is in anguish over what is about to happen to Him. He knows what’s coming and can barely stand it. So He takes His three closest disciples apart from the rest of the group and asks them to pray for Him in His hour of need. He then goes on a little further to be by Himself, and He pours out such anguish to His Father that blood vessels in His skin burst, and His blood falls to the ground like drops of sweat. But as if this weren’t enough to convince us that Jesus knows true agony, Jesus Himself provides a further detail, telling His disciples, “”My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death. Stay here and keep watch with me.” (Matt. 26:38).

Did you catch that? Jesus was so anguished it felt like the pain could kill Him. And that’s before the cross, before the physical ravages He endured. This is emotional pain He’s talking about.

Have you ever felt that kind of pain? If you have, you know what Jesus is talking about. Sometimes, grief and suffering are so great that it seems like they’re killing us. But did you know that Jesus understands? Not because He’s God and understands everything, but because He’s felt that way?

So then if Jesus knows the kind of pain we’re talking about—because He’s experienced it—yet He made it through, He is our best example for how we can still experience joy and victory even when circumstances are so bad we feel like we’re dying.

First, we need to realize that joy doesn’t mean we don’t feel pain, or that we like our circumstances. Jesus felt plenty of pain, and He sure wasn’t thrilled about what He was about to suffer. So what did His joy look like? It looked like worship. Jesus chose to worship His Father by being obedient even in the midst of incalculable anguish, thereby demonstrating that He believed His Father was still good and still worthy of worship even when His ways cause “sorrow to the point of death”.

When tragedy shatters our happiness, it’s easy to change our view of God. God must not be as loving as we thought, or not as caring, or not as good. But just as Jesus did in the midst of sorrow, we must hold on to our knowledge of who God is and not allow our emotions to determine what we believe God’s character to be. True joy comes only from God Himself, and worshipping Him is the only way we can experience joy in the midst of mourning.

What did Jesus’ victory look like? We know, of course, that He died on the cross and was raised by the Father three days later. That certainly was victory. But that victory began to be won in the garden, when Jesus determined that no matter the cost, He would still worship God no matter what. In that moment, the battle was won, and all that was left was for the details to play out.

We might not experience the victory of triumph over our circumstances until we reach heaven. But we can experience another kind of victory—triumph in our circumstances—even while they still rage around us. This is the kind of victory God offers us now, even though we may have to wait for the ultimate kind. It is not a kind of victory that erases our sorrow, but it is a kind that means we’ve won the battle.

In the midst of terrible circumstances, I would usually prefer that they had simply never happened. You probably would too. But that’s not a choice. We can’t go back and change what happened. The only thing we can do is cling to God and find our joy in Him, even while the tears stream down our faces. We can rely on what we know to be true about Him—that He loves and cares for us deeply, despite the circumstances He has caused or allowed—and derive our joy not from a perfectly designed situation, but from the only One who is a source of true joy no matter how life is going. And we can choose, as Jesus did, to worship Him no matter what, and experience a victory we never would have chosen, but the only one that can comfort our soul in the midst of pain.

I don’t know what kind of pain you are facing today. But I do know that God is there to meet you in it. Choose Him as your joy and victory now, in the midst of your sorrow. You can’t choose different circumstances. But you can choose to worship. No matter what.

Hebrews 12:2—looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

Changing the Rules

Megan Breedlove December 19, 2011 4 Comments

This evening, Lindsey and I were playing the board game Sorry. I love that game. It’s relatively simple so that even young children can play it, and it’s fun. Sometimes they win; sometimes I win.

Tonight, I won. Lindsey hadn’t really been paying attention to the game before then. She would focus long enough to take her turns, then start playing with other objects around her. But when I announced that I had won, she zeroed in on my four pawns sitting in the Home circle. She froze, with an uh-oh look on her face. Then she reached into the box, grabbed a yellow pawn and a red one, and plunked them down in my Start circle. “You forgot about these,” she said matter-of-factly.

Problem solved, right? If things don’t work out, you just change the rules.

In a game of Sorry, we can sometimes get away with that. In real life, we can’t. That’s because when things don’t turn out right, there’s usually no way to change the rules. You’re stuck with the results you didn’t want, and there’s no getting around it.

The only problem is, we don’t realize this. We think that when something bad happens, there has to be a way to undo it. But sometimes there isn’t. Sure, we can mitigate the circumstances. We can find something to do that will take away our pain, at least partly. But we can’t pretend that we really did get the job, or that our disabled child is really normal, or that death or a divorce didn’t really happen. We can’t go back and we can’t go around, so we’re stuck with going through.

That’s when we usually balk: when we realize there’s no way out but to accept the circumstances and feel the pain we can’t avoid. It happened, we’re trapped, and the only way out is to move forward.

Why write about something depressing at Christmas? Because many, many of us have been there or are still there. Because sometimes when we’re stuck, Christmas is the hardest time of all. But most of all, because 2,000 years ago, a tiny baby was born so He could help us through the things we can’t survive on our own.

He came to help us find the way out of our sin. He lived 33 years, then died on a cross to take the punishment for our sin so we wouldn’t have to. Through His birth, life, death, and resurrection, He made a way for us to be reconciled to God. No longer do we have to remain God’s enemies. We can be His friends now, His dearly beloved children.

He also came to help us find the way out of our circumstances. No, not necessarily to undo them, but to set us free from having to be trapped in them. Apart from Christ, when something bad happens to us, it’s impossible to rise above the effects. Sure, some people seem to make progress by sheer willpower or by a vague kind of spirituality. But this is not the complete victory Christ promises.

This victory doesn’t mean the circumstances won’t have happened to us. After all, Christ is called the victor over death, and death certainly happened to Him. But like Him, we can become victors over what has happened.

What does it mean to have victory over a circumstance we never wanted? Just this: that our soul’s security and joy remains ultimately unshaken. Our happiness may wind up in tatters, and we may be shaken for a time. But we can know that because of Christ, because of His love for us, because of the way He holds us secure when our very soul trembles uncontrollably, we will ultimately triumph over what happened.

I don’t know exactly what your triumph will look like, or when it will come. But I do know that it will come, because God has promised not to leave us or forsake us. He’s also promised that one day, we will enter heaven, and we will never sorrow again. Sometimes, when the pain is at its fiercest, we wonder whether it will ever end. It will. I don’t say so because it’s what I hope is true, or even because it’s what I have experienced. I say so because it’s what God has promised, and I trust Him.

You may be stuck with some horrible circumstances you never wanted. But you won’t be stuck with them forever. One day, in heaven, you will never sorrow about them again. And in the meantime, you can still experience joy even in the midst of heartrending anguish.

Next week, we’ll look at what joy and victory in the midst of anguish look like. I don’t promise to have all the answers. But I will share with you at least one answer God has provided. It’s one that He wants to use to minister to your heart.

Let’s meet here next week.

Psalm 121:1-2—I lift up my eyes to the hills—where does my help come from? My help comes from the LORD, the Maker of heaven and earth.