To understand the burden is to appreciate the blessing

Wednesday Word

Have you ever caught yourself focusing on what’s wrong in your life, instead of what’s right? Or how about what’s wrong about another person and their actions and attitudes, especially as they pertain to you? Why does it seem to be so much easier to focus on what’s wrong instead of what’s right?
 
Thanks for joining us for Wednesday’s Word with Kim-Evinda and Trench Classes United. Oh, how true it is to be blinded by what’s wrong and not be able to see what’s right. Come on in for a perspective on this common issue.
 
I don’t know about you but sometimes I can really be a negative Nelly. Funny, just writing about this is taking me back to when my mom used to call me Pollyanna! There were times she said it sarcastically – that was in our time of Exodus which was when I was 12 all the way to 49 -- but I’ll never forget the time she said it while she was in the hospital, and I was coming to see her every day.
I was telling her she had to get better so we could spend time together when she got out, and she smiled the sweetest smile – something I had rarely seen – and said, “You are such a Pollyanna.” 
 
It caused me to stop what I was doing and look at her to confirm she was really being sweet…she was.
 
It wasn’t until later that I looked it up and it made me weep and I do mean weep. My tears turned on like a faucet full blast and humility washed me clean of all the years where I had misunderstood her, focused on the burden of our broken relationship.
 
See, the definition for a Pollyanna is “an excessively cheerful or optimistic person”!
 
I never did get to discuss that with her because she never did make it out of the hospital, but, oh, how happy I was to be sad…for God had finally made right what was wrong all those years. God had brought blessing out of the burden, but without the burden, how could I realize the blessing?
 
During this difficult season, let me just say that I am having a difficult time being anyone’s Pollyanna! And yet, when I look back and see how far I’ve come from the shattering of my life almost a year ago, I can appreciate the blessing of my Heavenly Father, holding me, healing me, and helping me to continue moving forward, with me every step of the way.
 
Whenever I want to focus on the burden, Philippians 4:8 pulls me back to staying in my own lane, in other words, keeping my heart clean of resentments by focusing on MY relationship with Abba.
While God does not call us to be doormats for ANYONE, He does call us to get our focus on what is right by meditating on things that are true, noble and just – which may not describe the situation or the difficult person you are dealing with but there is ONE who is all of these things.
 
He calls us to mediate on anything that is praiseworthy, on things of any virtue. While my situation is not something praiseworthy, the blessings that have come from the painful burden are.
 
Friend, when we honestly seek our hearts and do this, we can honestly come up with something of virtue, something that is praiseworthy. This God-breathed command spoken to us through Paul reminds us to quit picking apart and looking for all that is wrong, for when we do focus on what is right, the guarantee we have is we will be changed!
 
How about you; are you a negative Nelly or a Pollyanna? Are you focusing on the burden without looking at all the blessings?
Reminded of and gripped by His grace,
 
Kim-Evinda