My Heart is Full

Hi All,
It is Friday night, my babies are asleep and my heart is full. What a blessed woman I am. I have a man who deeply loves me and four ornery, passionate children. There is not a passive one in the bunch. What ever they do is done with tremendous gusto. So our house has more drama than a 9:00 prime time television show.
I am reading a book entitled Unlimiting God by Richard Blackaby. This is a fantastic book and one I recommend for every Christian. Chapter six is about joy. He asks, "What is your threshold for joy?" Meaning, what events can occur that cause you irritation and suck your joy. If someone cuts you off in traffic, does that send you over the edge or does it take much more than that? As an illustration, he uses the story of Paul and Silas when they were in prison. They had just been severely beaten. In fact, many people that underwent a similar beating did not survive. Here they were with their feet and hands in shackles, bleeding and in pain and scripture tells us that around midnight they were heard singing praise songs. Now if anyone deserved a moment of self pity and asking God "Why?" it was them, but they chose the high road and praised their God for who He is. Blackaby goes on to say that joy is a choice. Choosing joy will not take the situation away or the possible emotions that go with it, but we will have a Godly perspective and not give Satan a foot hold with self pity.

I say all of this because for the past two months I have been climbing a steep hill to choose joy. It seems everywhere I turn I am confronted with a thorn. As an example, David's shift. In the evening when I am having a difficult time with the kids, I can almost audibly hear the enemy whisper, "You know, life sure would be a lot easier if David was on first shift." It is moments like this that I praise God that David has a job and praise Him for anything else I can think of. Too many times I agreeded with him and it only cause me tremendous grief and hurt my marriage. So as you can tell, some days I climb that hill to joy and then there are days I roll down it.

Tonight I got on the blog of a friend that I haven't spoken with in a long time. Her youngest daughter was born with a seizure disorder that has caused her numerous health issues and several trips to Children's Mercy. In her blog she spoke about how God used a recent situation with her daughter to speak to her and how close God has been to their family throughout all of this. After reading this, I felt like such a fool. Here I am with my healthy children and all of my abundant blessings and I have allowed Satan to get to me with, in comparison, things that seem so insignificant.

So, my question. How in shape are your praise muscles? Are they ready to fight for the joy that is rightly yours? I think of the statement that the Japanese leader said after Pearl Harbor, "I think that we have just awakened a sleeping giant." Satan has many tricks, but in choosing joy you will take one of them away and cause that Great Serpent to dig deep in his bag.

Keep Pushing Against the Rock,
Jennifer