I was talking to a friend of mine a few weeks ago. God really spoke something into my heart during our conversation. She was telling me about some struggles that she was having at the time. She is a military wife and mom of five kids. She had just found out that they would be transferring duty stations in a few short weeks.
This was right around the time that Jessi was waiting to hear back results from the tests they were doing on Baby Bean. We were unsure what was going on and if Baby Bean was going to make it.
Matt and I were in the thick of finding out we were chosen to parent a baby girl due in October and that we would have to have $50,000 for our adoption by then.
Let me just tell you. Life as a woman is HARD. It doesn’t matter if you have babies, are pregnant, are adopting, are empty nesting, or never had children to call your own. Life is hard and wholly overwhelming sometimes.
My friend just told me this week that they have to come up with $1,200 to fix the air conditioning in her car. They are scheduled to leave for vacation next week. She just paid to have her AC fixed last year in the same car.
I had a friend text me Sunday that she couldn’t make it to church because she had two flat tires and almost a blowout on a third.
We all have stories of how hard our days have been even this week. I had to work late Monday and be right back to work at 6:45 Tuesday morning. Life doesn’t seem fair, and it sure doesn’t feel easy.
As women, it seems like the weight of the world rests on our shoulders. We are responsible for coming up with dinner ideas, doing the laundry, making sure the kids are taken care of, balancing the checkbook, even when the math doesn’t work out, being good wives to our husbands, being good or even decent friends to our friends, making sure to cook for that dinner at church, heading to work each morning just to come home and work some more, studying lessons for Sunday school and children’s church and nursery and any other number of things, taking a casserole to that new mom or recent widow, visiting that person from your church in the nursing home, going to the grocery store, looking perfect or at least there on social media, and fitting time with God in there somewhere.
Our days are filled with STUFF. Hard stuff. Busy stuff. Kid stuff. Marriage stuff. Friend stuff. These are the things of life. They aren’t bad things, but they are things that can distract us from what is most important.
There have been a lot of days recently that I just want to cry. I’m so overwhelmed and worn out that I don’t think I can stand it.
I heard something recently that really made me think. I’m still struggling with applying it, but I would love to be able to practice this in my own life. When we get overwhelmed by the craziness in this life and we are so busy we don’t know which way is up, we need to first pray and then prioritize what needs to be done. I heard this in a work setting, but I wholly believe that it can be applied to every part of our lives.
Jessi and I decided months ago that we were going to do something called Project 89. It’s a ministry that challenges people to just dive into God’s Word. Every day you read a chapter from the gospels. There are 89 chapters spread out in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. The goal is to read through the chapter and journal about what you feel God is speaking to you. It’s about getting you alone with God so that He might speak to you through His Word. Forget the commentaries and whatnot, things that God has spoken to other people about or through. It’s about growing closer to God on your own apart from other people and developing your own relationship with God.
We did so well. We did it every day, maybe missing a day here or there. God was speaking to us and we were experiencing Him and His Word like never before.
I made it to Mark 11. That was in March. I hadn’t touched my journal (for this challenge) since then. 89 days is less than three months. We thought, we can do this. We will have each other to keep us accountable. I’m not sure how far Jessi made it, but I know it was right there around Mark 11. As humans, we fail each other sometimes. I failed to keep Jessi accountable.
We messed up. We quit when things got inconvenient (or hard or boring or fill in the blank).
God doesn’t do that though, does He? He always keeps us accountable through His Holy Spirit. How thankful we can be for that, right?
I’m thankful for the conviction of the Holy Spirit when I mess up and when my priorities get out of whack. I’m thankful that He always brings us back.
As women, I think a lot of times we fail to make time for God and seeking out His Word. We fail to prioritize our time with God above all the messy, not-as-important things of life. By all means, feed your babies or enjoy that sunset (or sunrise) or play a game with your family or friends. But we, as ladies and leaders to those around us or under our care, need to make sure that we are placing our relationship with God in an important place in our lives and make sure that we are carving out time to deepen our relationships with God.
When we mess up, we can always come back to God.
Let’s look at Psalm 51. This is one of my all-time favorite chapters in the bible.
A little background. David writes this Psalm after the prophet Nathan came to his to pronounce God’s judgment after David took Bathsheba in adultery and killed Uriah to try to hide his sin.
Now this is what we would consider a big sin. But all sin is sin. David was in a hard place, right?
We can apply the principles that David used in this passage to our own walks with God.
Let’s take a look at this scripture and just dwell in David’s cry to God. David surely was convicted over his sin, as we can see here.
Psalm 51
Have mercy on me, O God,
according to your steadfast love;
according to your abundant mercy
blot out my transgressions.
2 Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity,
and cleanse me from my sin!
3 For I know my transgressions,
and my sin is ever before me.
4 Against you, you only, have I sinned
and done what is evil in your sight,
so that you may be justified in your words
and blameless in your judgment.
5 Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity,
and in sin did my mother conceive me.
6 Behold, you delight in truth in the inward being,
and you teach me wisdom in the secret heart.
7 Purge me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;
wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.
8 Let me hear joy and gladness;
let the bones that you have broken rejoice.
9 Hide your face from my sins,
and blot out all my iniquities.
10 Create in me a clean heart, O God,
and renew a right spirit within me.
11 Cast me not away from your presence,
and take not your Holy Spirit from me.
12 Restore to me the joy of your salvation,
and uphold me with a willing spirit.
13 Then I will teach transgressors your ways,
and sinners will return to you.
14 Deliver me from bloodguiltiness, O God,
O God of my salvation,
and my tongue will sing aloud of your righteousness.
15 O Lord, open my lips,
and my mouth will declare your praise.
16 For you will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it;
you will not be pleased with a burnt offering.
17 The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit;
a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.
18 Do good to Zion in your good pleasure;
build up the walls of Jerusalem;
19 then will you delight in right sacrifices,
in burnt offerings and whole burnt offerings;
then bulls will be offered on your altar.
I went to a women’s conference several years ago where this scripture was the main scripture they taught on. Thank you to Christal for being able to find her notes unexpectedly and at the last second.
So what we can see here is that David came to God humbly. He came with humility and God met him where he was in his sin to bring forgiveness and reconciliation.
I love the picture of David’s relationship with God that we can see here.
Verses 1-2 focus on Conviction
2 Corinthians 7:10 tells us, “For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death.”
Verses 3-5 focus on Confession
David couldn’t make up for his sin. Uriah was dead. He couldn’t be brought back to life. Bathsheba was pregnant. That baby couldn’t be undone.
David did the only thing he could do. He turned back to God and repented of his sins. He cried out his confession and was restored to a place of fellowship and communion with God.
Pride keeps us from God. When we are prideful, we will not bow before God in brokenness over our sins. We will not call our sins what they are and turn from them in repentance.
Verses 6 focuses on Communion
Look at the promise found in Jeremiah 15:19, “Therefore thus says the LORD: ‘If you return, I will restore you, and you shall stand before me.’”
When we mess up, all we have to do it return to God. We don’t have to jump through hoops. We just have to turn back from the wrong we have been doing.
David knew where to go to be cleansed.
Read verses 7-12.
I LOVE verse 10-11. "Create in me a clean right, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Restore to be the joy of your salvation and uphold me with a willing spirit."
That’s something that only God can do. He can make us CLEAN, and only He can RESTORE our JOY.
So when we lose our way or our priorities get out of line, we feel the conviction of the Holy Spirit, we confess our sins, and we can come back to communion with God.
How awesome is that?
Thanks for reading!
In God,
Emily
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