I found myself sitting at the kitchen bar with my children the other day, and as I was contemplating our 6th and 7th moves in the last 5 years I decided that I wanted to be the responsible adult and help my children find joy through our trials. With excitement in my voice I asked them, “are you excited to move to Dublin for the summer?” This question was met with an array of funny faces and shrugs. Later that day, as I spent time reading and meditating, I found myself making the same array of funny faces in my own heart .For a moment I began to allow doubt and the fear of man to creep into my thoughts. Questions like, “Am I being lazy…… Am I not leading my family properly?
Should I be working harder and providing a more stable environment for my family?” began to creep into my mind. In the past. I have been prone to find myself wondering
“why is God moving us again?” I would question…. “Do others look at me and think that I am a fool? Do others think that I am not leading my family properly?” We as humans seem to be prone to easily see the negative in a situation first, and I am no exception to this. I also don’t think that being a native New Englander helps any in this situation.
As I continued meditating the Spirit began to convict my heart with scriptures that call us to find joy through our trials. To always be thankful. So how do I find thankfulness and joy in our soon to be 6th and 7th moves in 5 years?
I will choose to do what other godly men have done before us. Just like David returning to Ziklag and finding it burned and ravaged, wives and children gone, and his own men wanting to destroy him thinking it was his fault. I will “encourage myself in the Lord!”
So how do we find joy in this move?
Why did God take the Israelites the long way from Egypt to the promised land? Because He knew that their hearts would faint in war.
Why would He lead them to an impossible situation between the Red Sea and the Egyptian army.
To show himself mighty to them.
So how do i find joy in this move…….
I will choose to be thankful that everyone who was offered this apartment to live in chose not to….. God preserved it for us!
I will choose to be thankful that we will be able to spend the summer in one of the most beautiful and cool parts of our state!
I will choose to be thankful that we will have an opportunity to be refreshed and encouraged by the sweet fellowship of our brothers and sisters at MVBC!
So here we go to Dublin and as I have said to my children now multiple times this week, (better sounding if said with a British accent) not many people can say, “we’ll be moving to our summer home now…… We’ll be back to our second home soon enough.”
And in that I will sink down into a chair that I’ve never sat in before this weekend and smile as I think about my God. ? and if trusting and acknowledging God in all my ways is being foolish, then so be it…… I’ll choose to be a fool for Christ and allow him to direct my path. Proverbs 3:5-6