What We Focus On Expands

Wednesday Word

In the midst of all the pain, a light of truth shown so brightly that it paused the darkness named sorrow and suffering, and suddenly clarity came, out of nowhere, rendering me yet again humbled.
 
Thanks for joining us for Wednesday’s Word with Kim-Evinda and Trench Classes United.  Have you ever been so focused on what someone has done to hurt you that you had no idea you had a part in it? Today’s blog is for such a circumstance as this, and reveals something so freeing, we hope you will try it.
 
To step out of our own pain and pray for understanding is one of the hardest, but most rewarding spiritual exercises I have ever experienced...and continue to experience.
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How do we step out of our own pain? Change our focus, and for many of us, that’s not so easy, at least for me it’s not. Proverbs 3:5 tells us to lean not on our own understanding but in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will direct your path. There seems to be so many opportunities to apply this instruction lately, but let me share one from not too long ago:
 
I remember spending an entire night praying with a heart that cried out for help, asking my Heavenly Father to hold me and to reveal my part in a very painful situation. I had been so immersed in and blinded by my own pain, I just knew I had to do something different. So instead of sitting in my pain, focusing on my right to be mad, hurt, and angry, I changed my focus. I didn’t ask Him to change the other person; I begged Him to reveal my part.
 
Now, this requires that we sit in that pain, if you will, and not run from it, as many of us are tempted to do. Society teaches us that we shouldn’t feel pain; we should only do what makes us happy. Why is that false? Because pain and sorrow can bring understanding, but only if we change our focus to the One whose plan is to help us, lift us up and out of ourselves that we may learn from the pain.  Let me say this: God wastes NOTHING, and certainly not any pain or sorrow.
 
In other words, sometimes it takes pain to learn a lesson, to discover more about ourselves, to cut away that which needs to go that we may become more like our Creator.
 
My daughter-in-love gave me a beautiful word a while ago that emphasizes what I’m trying to share here: What we focus on expands. What is it I wish to expand? My pain or His plan?
 
My heart is yet again soothed to know He is with me in it all; He’s highly invested in expanding my character and as I let Him change me, the pain diminishes and turns into understanding…and my heart smiles again.

May we keep our eyes on The One Who knows all things and works all things together for His glory and our eventual good.
 
Love,
Kim-Evinda