Get Back In That Saddle
If you want to see true resiliency, watch a child.
When we were seven years old the past was only seven years long. It’s questionable how much of that seven years we could have remembered on our seventh birthday.
Of course, important things are ingrained in us by our parents: hot, no, eat, etc. The big things take big actions to help us remember to, or not to do something. But what about those times that shake us? Nightmares, falls, bumps and bruises. Loss. Do those sit in our memory for us to drudge up again and again? At eight years old, did we wake up the morning after getting a spanking and still feel the somberness that followed that correction or did we look forward to breakfast and all the things that could happen during the new day?
As I spend this morning hoping for the praise music playing around me to lift my spirits I catch myself hearing the words for the first time. Songs that I can sing along to, I’m now actually hearing. These songs are telling me the truth and I’m digesting them and pondering them as my spirit is trying so hard to hang on to the disappointments that yesterday held. The sadness. The restless sleep that followed and the heart that hurt so badly yesterday...beats still today.
“It’s okay to cry, it’s okay to fall apart. You don’t have to try to be strong when you are not, it may take some time to make sense of your thoughts...Sometimes the only way to heal a broken heart is when we fall apart” plays behind me and I feel my God holding me. “There’s healing in the story of your scars”.
How freeing it is to be able to pour out our tears to our Father. He knows what it feels like to have a broken heart, as sinners we surely hurt Him every day. But every day He shows us His mercy and gives us a chance to make a new day. What we do with it is up to us.
Starting now I’m choosing to look past the hurts from yesterday and make today different. I cannot change yesterday but I can learn from it. I can grow from it and I can move forward and make today better. And one day, I can use yesterday to help someone who may be experiencing the same broken heartedness to see that they can move on too.
God is our Pain Taker, our Way Maker, our Savior, our Chain Breaker and I’m shaking off yesterday while I “Dance when circumstances drown the music out” using the Holy Spirit and this beautiful day to remind me.
I AM thankful for my scars. They make me stronger because they make me depend on the healing power of the blood of Jesus Christ that I am covered by. I have hope. I have grace and I have faith. I’m living as a light for Christ and little eyes are watching. They don’t even know that their light is much brighter than my own. They are are living the life that is proof of His love. And that speaks volumes to how we should be as well.
I wanna live like a seven year old. I want to look forward to today with eyes like an eleven year old and I want to love like a child again. I am a child after all, A child of God.
Blessed beyond measure and saddlin’ up! Let’s go make this a great day in the LORD!
*song credits I urge you to listen to:
(Ryan Stevenson-When We Fall Apart)
(Chain Breaker-Zach Williams)
(Say I Won’t-Mercy Me)
(The Great Adventure-Steven Curtis Chapman)
(The Proof of Your Love-King and Country)
