Saturday 22nd March, 2014
I woke up this morning thinking about my life. I am seeing my Dr on Monday morning to ask for some tests be done on my thyroid, my liver and my heart, to see if any of them are the reason for the discolouration and sensations in my lower legs. A friend who owns the beauty store in town told me yesterday that both her father and her husband had the same symptoms on their legs and that it was from pesticides from working on a cane farm. Her father has since passed away.
Now, when I was first diagnosed with my RA, I told the Drs and specialists that I believed I got it from pesticides and they said it wasn’t that. I KNOW that is exactly why I got sick. I had a predisposition to RA and I honestly believe that being healthy one day, then sitting in a field of gladioli’s weeding them the day after they were sprayed, to being bed ridden within days of that for over a year says to me that it was the pesticides.
Anyway, I have been making a mental list of all my ailments that I am going to type out and take with me on Monday, and there are just so many it started to make me sad, and thoughtful…
What would my life be like if I was healthy? What are the things that keep me from living a better life, even with all these ailments. I thought of two words; lazy and fear. I am lazy with everything. Housework, any work I do for myself, exercise, reading my Bible, going to church and life group, cooking, shopping, visiting friends, etc, etc, etc… I start things, but get discouraged if and when they don’t work out like I want them to so I just give up.
I have tried to persist with some things – like my lampwork, but my hands were just too sore to keep doing it. I felt that people weren’t valuing my lampwork anyway, so I would rather just not do it than spend all that time and put all that literal pain and effort into it only to practically give my work away. I will do things differently if I start it up again.
My journaling; I see so many beautiful and gorgeous works of art on the sites and I just get discouraged. No matter how many times I hear, “you have to practice every day in order to become good”, I just give up. I get discouraged and give up. I am too lazy to keep trying. I fear that discouraging voice in my head.
If I could get rid of two things from my life, they would be laziness and fear.
Coming downstairs to my computer and reading today’s Word for the Day was beautiful. So appropriate and so needed.
A truth that I never tire of being reminded of; God knows what I need even before I ask it.
Thank you Jesus.
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Thinking and Acting like Jesus (1) |
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‘Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus.’ Philippians 2:5 NIV |
| Max Lucado writes: ‘What would your life be like, even for one day, if you were to think and act like Jesus? If His priorities governed your actions, His passions drove your decisions and His love directed your behaviour? What would you be like? Would people notice the change in you? Would your family see something new? Would your co-workers sense a difference? What about the less fortunate; would you treat them like you normally do? How about your friends; would they detect more joy? How about your enemies; would they receive more grace and mercy? And how would it affect you personally? Your mood swings? Your temper? Would you sleep better? Would you view death differently? Would you pay your taxes differently? Any chance you’d need fewer aspirins or sedatives? How about your reaction to traffic delays? Or when the deal falls through, or people don’t do what you want them to? Would you still dread what you are dreading? Better yet, would you still do what you are doing? Pause and think about your schedule, obligations, engagements, outings and appointments. With Jesus fully in control, would these all change? Keep working on this for a moment. Adjust the lens of your imagination until you have a clear picture of Jesus leading your life, then snap the shutter and frame the image. What you see is what God wants! Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus. If you committed to living this way for a lifetime, or a year, or even a month, you would be a transformed person. So just try it for one day: today!’ |