I had an "I don't want to grow up" stint this past week adjusting to a new job where I was questioning my ability to do my job right and to make a difference.  Pile on some decisions I have to make soon concerning my future and a great amount of anxiety about the upcoming holidays.  I just became one big ball of tension!  For a moment, I imagined life being a little easier where I wasn't challenged in so many ways and where everything just worked out right without much effort.  Then I thought about the Easy Button and how nice it would be if it were something real that could be pushed and *shazam* everything turns right side up.  Problems go away, folks act and treat you the way you expect, responsibilities become a little lighter, and days aren't so hectic.  Smooth sailing.  But since that button doesn't really exist with those functions, in my mind I have escaped to a small town in South America, living a simple life selling fruit in a street market (as I always say when I feel the urge to press eject).

Much has shifted and moved lately, in a good way, but it doesn't mean that with the shifts there wasn't going to be some pressure applied [I'm reminding myself].  Pressure is definitely not comfortable and neither is coming out of your comfort zone.  Seems like when I'm taken to a new level there is an element of difficulty.  I am grateful for the opportunities God has presented for me, no doubt.  Think about gymnasts competing in the Olympics.  It's definitely an honor to be there in the first place!  There's a portion of their score that judged partly off of level of difficulty.  Meaning that that there is an element to their performance that maybe they've never done before, was attempted.  If they want to beat their competitors, they not only have perfect that element but do it better than everyone else.  That's pressure!  Just because the element may look nice on TV doesn't mean that it was easy for them to do.  But what if someone won the gold medal for completing a cartwheel alone.  Was much effort really put into winning that medal?  Maybe if you were athletically challenged but for a good number of us, it can be done without much effort.  Would the gold medal be appreciated if there wasn't any blood, sweat and tears put into it?  It makes you think why our victories are sweeter when we've cried a little or thought this was the end of us but came to find out that it really wasn't.  Then we look back and say "I don't even know how I made it through that hot mess!" 

I've also thought about labor and why God designed it the way He did.  The easy thing would be for your stomach to detach somehow and there's the baby.  But it's an intense moment in time that tests you and seems like is pushing you to your limits (unless you've had an easy labor).  I've always heard mothers say that once the baby arrived, everything they went through to get to that point seemed to disappear.  For whatever pain or pressure was experienced, the end result makes it worth it all.  I'm looking forward to that moment.  But in the meantime, I have enough life moments like this illustration to labor through.  The end results will be worth it and I know it.  So do we really want life to be easy, taking it for granted?  Or do we want to be pushed to explore our abilities and enjoy the fruits of our labor?  I believe the latter.


Dear Lord,

Help me not to take the easy way out but to persevere, giving you a chance to show your ability through me.  Your word says that you are the greater one in me and there is nothing too hard for me.  Remind me of that, when I forget.  In Jesus' Name,  Amen.