Gentle Reader,
Golden-hued light streams through the windows across the back of my house. In the front yard, the color of the maple tree shifts from bright yellow to near-orange. Dark green veins on the leaves flicker and fight on, valiantly drawing nutrients from the rough, graying trunk until the last possible moment. Cold, frost-bitten mornings keep the dogs abed later than usual. Their fur grows thicker and fluffier.
Autumn continues to wind itself around the landscape. The view changes daily, a transformation made almost as if by magic. Blink and you’ll miss it. But the animals, they know. They begin slow down. Their Creator whispers that it’s time for them to rest. Gather up sustenance for snowy days ahead, curl up in a ball and drape your tail across your face.
One by one, the birds will stop trilling. The squirrels will stop darting across busy streets. They will hunker down and observe the turning of the seasons, confident and content in the care of the hands that fashioned them.
Kate says: overcome.
Go.
The technician smeared the cold jelly across my abdomen. I closed my eyes, preparing for the onslaught. Down came the probe. She was just doing her job. But I wanted to kick her or bite her or something. I bit my lips and clenched my fists to keep from screaming. A few tears sneaked past the lashes pressed tight against my cheeks. She pressed harder, moving across the long scar, stopping when she reached the spot that hurts the most.
A tumor hunting we will go.
The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not want…
I’ve written about Barnabas. I want to be like this dude. Without him, the church leaders in Jerusalem may have never accepted Paul. Without him, John Mark may have never gotten a second chance. He got down there, in the hard stuff with the broken people. He urged them on. He stood his ground. This behind-the-scenes servant of God did all that he could to uplift and encourage.
Part of that, I think, included speaking truth that most of us would rather ignore.
So: Don’t wallow. Don’t make excuses. Don’t whine.
Suffering is real. Pain sucks. Illness is the worst. There’s nothing glamorous about malfunctioning bodies, damaged relationships, empty bank accounts, You’re going to weep and doubt and rage at God sometimes. You’re going to hate all the tests and trials. You’re going to want to slap well-meaning people who say stupid things. You’re going to want to sit down, throw your hands in the air and quit.
Don’t.
Square your shoulders and lift your weary head. God didn’t make you so you could lay down in the dirt and die before your time. Grit your teeth. Press onward. Move forward. Don’t allow victimization to turn you into a perpetual victim. Don’t allow yourself to think that the world owes you anything. Don’t waste your time coveting what others have. Don’t waste your energy on black, soul-eating bitterness.
As Eric Matthews said, “Life’s tough. Get a helmet.”
If there’s still breath in your lungs, your race isn’t done.
By the power of the Holy Spirit within, fight.
Overcome.
What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things? Who shall bring a charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written:
“For Your sake we are killed all day long;
We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.”Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
…
You are of God, little children, and have overcome them, because He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world.
– Romans 8:31-39, 1 John 4:4 (NKJV)
Stop.
