In a Funk

Sunday was just not the day I had envisioned.  Between the January stomach virus apocalypse, to February travel, to our Spring Break trip, I feel like we've missed a lot of church this year! I hate it, because we are in the middle of a great Exodus series and I just love seeing my people at church! 

THIS SUNDAY was finally a "normal" Sunday. We were all in town. We were healthy. We were awake on time. We even both had showers. Jeremie and I walked into the kitchen to start Lil G's breakfast and we opened the fridge.....and found darkness. Everything was home but the lights were not on.  Nor was the coolness. It had totally kicked the bucket during the night. So we immediately began Operation Ice Chest. Save everything that is worth saving. Jeremie did have to buy the large white one on the right, but I'm almost ashamed to say that the other three were actually in the garage. (Where one ice chests is good, 5 are better, right?) I will vouch that the football one belongs to our Michigan friends. (Funny thing is that a totally different Michigan friend made fun of it when I sent her this pic...#birdsofafeather)

Needless to say, this took a good while so we had to ditch our church efforts.  I was so disappointed. Realizing that there was no handy man available on a perfectly good Sunday, we decided to make the most of the beautiful weather and head to one of our favorite parks.  The problem was, Greyson wasn't feelin' it.  I guess he needed Jesus that day, because he was in total rebellion.

He completely despised everything on the {amazing} playground.  The ride around the lake in his red wagon (that HE insisted we bring) was not his fancy. The brand new little basketball that J bought him that morning (an EXACT replica of our neighbor's that he obsessed over the day before) was completely absurd to him.  Honestly, you KNOW I love my little cherub, but at one point, J and I looked at each other like:  "And WHY did we decide to become parents?" 

I couldn't even get a decent selfie to lie on social media and convince the world that we were soaking in the beauty of the day and the magic of quality time. 

We muscled through lunch at McAllisters because we didn't feel like diggin' through the ice we had just so carefully packed everything in to find lunch material.

About that time, we realized Greyson MIGHT NOT be demon possessed, but perhaps sick. Cause he was showing all the signs.  Sure enough when we got home, his temperature was 101.2. Sweet. Nobody was happy. We were all feeding off each others' irritability.

Please know that I KNOW these are first world problems. I am super grateful for my family and all that I have. But I don't think it's wrong to just be plain frustrated. In FACT, I really was thinking about the verses "Consider it pure joy whenever you face trials of many kinds" (James 1:2) and "For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all." (2 Corinthians 4:17) Now, I realize that the biblical writers weren't writing about the normal frustrations of a day.  But I do think that how we repeatedly handle normal frustrations says something about what we think about God, and in turn, has eternal implications.

That being said...I DON'T HANDLE THEM WELL. Or on this day, I didn't. I tend to have a better "Jesus Take the Wheel" mind set when it's something BIG. Sickness. Loss of job. House fire. When I have absolutely NO control, I seem to hand it over (or UP I guess) more easily. In a day that just kinda "stunk", I showed no control over my mood, and instead, just decided on a bad one.

I let the funk seep into the next morning.  During my quiet time, I told God: "You know I have a bad attitude right now.  I'm in a funk.  I'm sorry.  So just please give me mercy and grace in this. Help me stop and just take hold of joy." 

And LISTEN to what one of the reference verses in my study was after that: "Let us approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need." (Hebrews 4:16) 

Ummm...YES PLEASE. I'm sorry, but if that isn't the audible voice of God I don't know what is. I've read this verse a million times, and it's never hit me like this before.  I think I've sort of skimmed over the "receive mercy and find grace" portion, and gone straight to the "in times of need ".  Therefore, I've attributed this verse to traditional "prayer requests".  Now, of course we can approach the throne in any type of prayer request because God loves his people and he hears our prayers. But this verse is talking more about our weaknesses, our inner struggles. The previous verse says: "For we do not have a high priest {Jesus} who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are, yet was without sin." When he walked the earth as a human, he experienced the BIG things. Bigger than we will ever imagine or endure. But he also endured all the little things. As a carpenter, I bet his tools broke mid-project. Ugh. I bet he made the wrong measurement a few times. I'll bet some people complained about his work and I bet some of his tasks felt super mundane sometimes.

And that is why He can offer mercy (freedom from judgement) and grace (undeserved kindness.) Because he understands. Because He loves us SO unconditionally that he desires to lavish us with mercy and grace even during times of "weaknesses".  And because there is no shame in bringing these things to Him, because He's already paid the price for our judgement. He is the only source that can pour out this type of love.  Humans would be all comparing who had the more "legitimate" weakness and telling each other to get over it.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go pour fresh ice over our 72 ice chests.  If you're wondering the fridge IS FIXED. We just have to wait 24 hours for it to cool down enough to put anything back in. DUH.