God's Story

I have neglected to blog in a while and I hate that because I wanted to be consistent, but hopefully this week I will do better!

Well the first thing I'll say is that my husband is a rockstar! He led worship for three different conferences in the last 2 weeks. I got to be right there with him, which was really incredible.

Not this past weekend, but the weekend before, David led for the Esther conference. I got to go through the experience and it was absolutely wonderful. I feel like God spoke to me in such sweet ways.

There are countless things that I took from that weekend, but one that I want to share right now is a point Pat Wade made in the very first session.

The reason why the story of Esther is so beautiful is because of the bigger picture. God used an ordinary woman to redeem an entire nation, the nation that would eventually produce the Messiah!

One of the first things Pat said was too many times we get so infatuated with our own little story that we miss the big story of what God is doing in our lives. This really spoke to me.

I am a pretty emotional person and have a tendency to see the glass half empty instead of half full. I have struggled with my self-image my whole life and if I'm not careful, I can become discontented very easily and spend more time wishing my life was different instead of doing something about it.

I've focused so much on my story; establishing my career, finding my husband, buying a house, building my family, fitting into all the "rules" of being a young Christian woman in America. When things haven't gone my way, I get frustrated with God and whine and complain about my story, when really, my story is part of the big story of God redeeming this nation! I'm sure Esther had other plans besides joining King Xerxes's harem, but she followed the Lord's plan and He was glorified because of it.

"Don't you know that there is nothing touching your life that has not first been sifted through the hands of the Father?" Everything we face is part of God's big, grand, glorious plan.

"If we're not careful, we can think this whole thing is about us." Your life is important and your trials and complaints are important to the Lord, but I would encourage you today to take your mind off of your story and focus on God's story. Your trials may be just the thing that will help redeem a nation!

I'll leave you with this thought via Pat Wade.

On Palm Sunday Jesus rode into the city on a donkey and the people praised him and shouted out "Hosanna!" (Only to crucify Him a week later)

"Don't you know that the donkey thought all the Hosannas were for him?" ~Pat Wade

Don't think like the donkey, friends! Focus on God's story today!