I asked God, how it is that those who keep going, loving, and giving, and fighting the fight, keep from being broken. After a while, a tender heart can only take so much. It is the tenderest of hearts that seek to please God. It is tempting to let my heart harden, because life hurts. I get it.  Some people say, “you need to grow a thicker skin” as if it is something a person can change. There’s already too many hard hearts. I don’t really want to harden mine, I just want to quit getting hurt.

I know God takes broken things and makes something beautiful and He will reveal His mosaic in His own time,  although we may plead to understand, to see now what it’s all for, sometimes His answer is just “Not yet”

Last night, I had a dream that I was somehow back being a nurse again. I knew I was not able, yet I had been left with patients to care for, they were counting on my help, so I did the best I could.  When I woke up, I was relived that it was only a dream, because I always wanted to do a good job, and if that scenario had been real, it would have been very distressing to me. I do feel fellow humans owe one another a modicum of concern and consideration.

I think when we receive the glorification God has promised, we will feel a similar sense of relief. I expect that moment when we realize this present life with it’s trials, betrayals, and with all it’s weight, was a mist that has now dissapated like a puff of smoke, this will be a great relief.

In battle, there are always wounded soldiers. For those that receive  wounds extensive enough that they must leave the battlefield altogether, this doesn’t make them “lesser-than” the soldiers who are still fighting, but they may feel less-than anyway. And it doesn’t even matter if it was  due to some poor choice or negligence on their part or whether it just happened because it’s war and in wars, people get hurt. It can be enemy fire or accidental “friendly fire”.  When the wounded evacuate, part of their heart likely remains out there with those still fighting, but I imagine there is certain relief too, in having the fight taken out of your hands. It may not be rational for the wounded to see that as a failure, but I have heard combat vets express this and I’m the same way.

Being a Christ-follower in enemy territory is not much different.

Many of us instinctively tend to isolate for a while when wounded. I know I do. Over and over I have chosen to keep caring, but I will admit, it’s not as reflexive as it once was for me.

Having been in the fight at all, changes you and for better or for worse you never really go back to being who you were before.

Man’s wars have no glory. Generally, those fighting likely are led to believe they are fighting for one thing, while those who have sent them into battle, have less honorable motives. That’s the story of physical, secular war, but is spiritual combat supposed to be that way?

Life itself is a spiritual war for us. As much as I sometimes wish I could be oblivious to that, facts are facts. I can’t un-know what I know.

Yes we have a dependable commander. There’s no subterfuge. He made the mission clear and provides all the the protective gear and weapons we need.It’s still hard.

We have 2 military sons and one military daughter-in-law. In boot camp, there’s someone telling you what to do at all times, tasked with the objective of training and requiring discipline, but once you move on to MOS training, there’s an expectation you will maintain the required discipline to progress through that next level. You’ll always have superiors to answer to, but once assigned to your station, you are expexted to know what your duty is and carry out your assignment with autonomy. The longer you are in, the more you are expected to know, and discipline in getting the job done should just be second nature by then.

The Apostle Paul admonished about fighting to win the crown, and finishing the race, but just like the apostles of Christ, it takes a while for us to grasp the full message and implications of the heads-up Jesus gave them.

There is, one significant difference between spiritual war and most manmade physical wars.  In physical wars, most of the time it is abundantly clear who the enemy is. But in spiritual battle we have an enemy that is diabolically adept at  making us think someone else is the enemy, usually someone within our own ranks. The age-old divide and conquer. We know from our ” textbook/training manual that the enemy is principalities and powers, not flesh and blood, but boy does our flesh (also an enemy) take that bait, especially if we aren’t walking in the Spirit. To walk in the Spirit means never letting your guard down in the midst of war. But war doesn’t cease at 5pm with weekends off. It’s 24/7/365. No human is capable of staying vigilant 24/7. That’s why we need to be part of a body.

I’m “preaching” to myself, because I’ve taken a number of hits, still walking my walk, but with a limp, let’s just say.  Personal attacks, unfairly judged, betrayals. It’s the people we care about who have the power to wound us the most deeply.

Everything about life on Earth in 2024 has turned murky, hasn’t it? Kinda like being a fish in a tank with a clogged filter. Alot like that, actually!

We get tired. We lose our bearings. Despite our best intentions, we faint. We get things up on our own shoulders because so much comes at us at once, it’s overwhelming. Sometimes the sudden chaos and sheer magnitude of the storm can become so overpowering that  there’s no time to stop and think it through. We go into survival mode. Sometimes we are so battered we can’t hardly think, we freeze, and we may get captured for a time. The enemy has us hostage. We may enter a state of numbness just to survive.

Speaking spiritually, is it failure when that happens? I don’t know. Maybe. Certainly it can feel like failure, and yet, sometimes God has to end one thing in our lives in order to do the next thing. When we are squeezed, our worst comes out, the things within us that we may have sincerely tried to defeat, but haven’t quite got there yet. I always struggle with knowing what’s God’s part and what’s the part He expects me to achieve/rise to.

I know He who began a good work in me will be faithful to complete it. All the trying I do, seems futile. I know my own efforts will not turn me into the person He wants me to be, but I also kniw effort is expected.  In molding us the Lord operates in seasons. He chips away here, adds something there. He deals with our sinful flesh, but so many times, I wish Jesus would just appear on my couch and tell me what He wants from me.

Even the best, most grounded-in-the-rightly-divided Word preachers and teachers out there, in my humble opinion, often send the message of pulling yourself up (as by the proverbial bootstraps), keeping yourself prayed up, standing strong, staying in the fight etc, they mean well, but  God says, “My strength is made perfect (complete) in your weakness”. I’ve tried “trying hard”, I’ve tried “not trying and waiting”.

I know I lose perspective at times. I get my focus off the Lord. I get miffed because life is just baffling sometimes and that’s so frustrating.

If weakness is what it takes, I’ve got that in spades.

I don’t know. Just being honest.

Maybe what looks like failure, is actually progress. His ways are not our ways. His thoughts are not our thoughts.

I know my perspective often gets wonky. It’s back to the drawing board. Back to doing the things He’s told us we ought to do.

I have been guilty of letting down my spiritual guard at times because the watching is hard. Being informed, having to know ugly things. Life in 2024.   Spiritual attacks come in many shapes and sizes. They are custom designed, and generalky very calculatedly personalized.

I’m 60 now, but I feel even older than that!

My greatest vulnerability to pain is in relationships.

Jesus was wounded in the house of His friends. If we share in His glory, which we do, and will even more so in the next life, we will also share in His suffering. Things that hurt one person, may roll right off the back of another person. For the longest time, I considered any broken relationship a personal failure, and refused to let go, even if it meant absorbing the blow in the name of grace and just getting past something. I tended to just keep trying, but I’m not sure anymore that’s as virtuous as I had once thought it was. It may have been more like a waste. (Pearls/swine, etc).

The Bible says there is a time for everything. A time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing. (Ecclesiastes 3)

It’s mercy that He opens up our understanding to what is in His book. Sometimes, especially when I spend time in the Old Testament, I lose sight of “God -as-parent”. It is very convicting, that Old Testament. I guess that’s why many Christians don’t even read it. Old Testament saints were under a different program. That was not the age of grace. I have to put my mind on the way I feel about my own kids, in order to even vaguely conceive of how God as Father sees me.  When they were little, we didn’t expect them to act mature. When they were teens, we expected more responsibility.

Sometimes, I wish God would let me see myself through His eyes. What, if anything, is He pleased with, and what, (if it were possible and He didn’t know the end from the beginning), would He be disappointed about.

I think my life’s history has made it extremely hard for me to know where I stand with others. And knowing where I stand is extremely important to me. Trauma does that to a person. My entire nervous system is wrecked. Being profoundly hard of hearing, plus having an overactive, uber sensitive nervous system, I get startled a lot. You know how we sometimes doze off then “jump” awake, having not realized we were asleep? I have that experience without falling asleep. I can be sitting quietly working on embroidery, and maybe a nerve twinges in my little toe. I’ll have a significant whole body startle response to the tiny twinge. It’s ridiculous!

I have significant tremors as well. Neurologist says they’re the kind called “intentional tremor”. Not that they are intentionally made to happen, but rather, say my intent is to thread a needle. That’s hard as it is, with failing eyesight ( newly diagnosed early cataracts) but the more intent (determined) I am to get it threaded, the worse my hands shake. The tremor isn’t there at rest, so he said it’s not Parkinsons. It also isn’t always present. Sometimes it goes away.

It’s life in a fallen world.

Found out at my recent yearly eye exam, about having early cararacts. He said it’s usually about 5 years before that gets bad enough to start looking at surgery. Man, I already have to see doctors more often than I like. I don’t want to think about more surgeries. No faith in docs, no faith in hospitals.

I hold onto hope that the Lord comes for us before I have to think about that, as well as knee replacement that is nearly inevitable if I want to remain functional.

For now, I am just trying to soak up  good sermons, and hymns, and take each day as it comes. God has gotten me through the  21,997 days I have lived thus far, and there are certainly fewer than that many days between me and heaven at this juncture. But man is it hard.

Teach us to pray, Lord, set our feet on Your path and let us not wander from it or faint in weariness. We ask your mercy, not because we deserve it, but because You are merciful. Purify our hearts, our hands, our speech. Block every intention and effort of the enemy to stir up violence and strife. Bring us individually to our knees, and show us any and every thing in our lives that displeases you, that we might confess and repent, and every one who professes Your name, might come before You to have our hearts searched and our ways examined. We know that this age is winding down, and that prophecy will be fulfilled, but I fully still believe that the way things go between now and then, in America and in the world, can be better or worse depending whether your people humble ourselves and submit to You. We pray for peace. Most of the world longs for peace, but America in particular has much to answer for. Help your church, each individual member, help us all understand what it means to be salt and light, to understand that you didn’t create us for the purpose of doing just whatever we feel like in life, but for your own good pleasure and purpose, for doing good works that You determined and set forth. Please help us carry on. Please guide Your shepherds, and all whom You have given governmental authority in every nation. We know the evildoers will soon be cut down as grass and wither as the green herb. May your name be exalted in every congress and parlaiment, every courtroom and boardroom  and every nation.  We pray for the peace of Jerusalem. We pray for the breaking down of the enemy’s strongholds.  In every instance where one of Your own is suffering, may we submit to Your sovrienty, and know that through suffering, You not only sanctify, but as we submit, You work all things for good, and provide us a testimony and a means to eventually comfort others. Help us love one another.  Abba, it would sure be nice to come home today, but we would rather see our loved ones saved. People are coming back to You, while those who were pretenders are being exposed. You are separating wheat from tares. Especially, Lord, draw near and hold close the elderly, the children. This world has become a heartbreaking and ruthless place, and yet there are thise who are faithfully being salt and light. Some of us are more at a “widows mite”  at this point, so fillbus with your Spirit. You have your people everywhere. A family that will soon be together. Help each one. Give us fullness of Your Spirit, boldness, fearlessness to tell others the gospel. Give us day by day, what we need for that day. Comfort the hurting, save the lost, put down evil. Guide us. Especially as we approach the date of election.  Preserve life, thwart plans for destruction and chaos. Thank you for brothers and sisters all over the world who are praying for the US election. As to the outcome, Your will be done. Please, please, please prepare each of us for what You know lies ahead. I speak for many when I say we are so tired and vexed.  We praise You and we love You and we trust You. Where trust fakters, help our unbelief.  We ask these things only in the name of Jesus under Whose shed blood we are covered. Amen