Weep Now, Sing Later

Praying that God will give you strength to fight feelings of unworthiness, and replace any doubt/fear with His courage and strength and purpose. No matter where you are or what you are doing, there will always always be people there to criticize you. You can choose how to respond. You can be brought down and discouraged by it, you can become prideful and calloused by it, or you can choose to take it to God...ask Him to reveal any truth that will strengthen you and grow you from it, and choose to leave the rest behind.

 You need to give yourself grace, even if no one else does. AND know that just because someone criticizes something, that doesn't mean that they are right. You have the responsibility to take everything to God and let HIS truth be the judge. Everything else, you must release, forgive, and move forward in God's call

I understand. It can be hard to wade through other people's opinions. Ultimately, God's matters more than anything else. His should hold the most weight, even far above your own.

 I read something on Facebook recently from Sadie from Duck Dynasty. So I many people were taking about her family. This  article  was talking about how her family has been under attack and such and she said something along the lines of, "if you're holding the football, you're going to get tackled."  That's kind of how life is as a Christian....when you are holding the football (aka doing what God has called you to do) you will get tackeled (criticized and poked at...persecution comes with every calling)

This is all a part of the refining fire. It hurts. IT sucks...it's hard. But you're being shaped and molded by this all. At the hand of the safest, most loving creator God, you are being shaped into His most precious creation.

It's not meant to hurt you, although it will bring pain...it's good for you ultimately....cake batter must be put in the oven to cook before it can be what it was designed to be.

You are being brought through the fire and being shaped and made into what God designed you to be from the very beginning of time

Without the fire, like the cake batter, you're just a sweet gooey mess.

That could potentionally give someone salmonella..ew . But how true is that? When I am not healthy, when I am not refined and matured in my faith, allowing God to prune me and heal me as he grows me, I often do more damage to the people around me than I realize.

Press on towards the goal... bend...bend to the hand of God. LET HIM have you. Let Him have His way in your heart, let Him mold you and teach you...break you, and then build you. "pressing on" = yielding to what He's doing in your life. Oh what a glorious season. Although difficult, THIS season is what will produce the fruit in the next. Tilling the land, planting the seeds so that the growth may spring forth

Perhaps you are thinking, "I feel like He's tilling my entire life right now.. It couldn't have been just one area at a time?"  It seems to all come at once, we want relief, we want less... But what good would that do? To have an entire field that could produce a crop, and only prepare a small corner of it...that wouldn't make much sense. A small corner of harvest wouldn't produce enough food to sustain you.

You must have the  whole crop...so that you can live in the abundant life He has planned.

"Those who plant in tears will harvest with shouts of joy. They will weep as they go to plant their seed, but they will sing as they return with the harvest." Psalm 126:5-6