Fighting the Holiday Battles, both Big and Small

The Christmas season seems to get busier and more frustrating every year...as family needs increase and as retailers, merchants, service providers, and shoppers all grow more stressed and irritable - causing them to make mistakes or become negligent creating havoc for everyone. I've vented about my own frustrating experiences on here way too much. While I may feel the need to vent all the emotions out first so my heart and mind are open to receive the lesson or a word from the Lord, I cannot leave the venting out there without sharing the lesson or message that followed.

I have found that I have a much better attitude about frustrating circumstances, unfair treatment, or persecution, when it's obvious persecution for Christ (Matthew 5:9). If it's spiritual warfare before a mission trip, I'm usually ready and armored up. (Ephesians 6: 10-18) If I'm being ridiculed, targeted, and treated unfairly by haters of God and His word because of my faith, then I'm not surprised and know to draw my strength from Him to bear it gladly. When facing gut-wrenching pain or grief, we believers know we are powerless on our own to get through it, so we trust only in our gracious God who possesses all power, authority, and sovereignty.

But the enemy knows our weaknesses. He knows how to distract us and when we are more likely to trust in our own strength instead of looking up to God. He also knows that he is more likely to lead us astray if he chips away at us, little by little, with small irritations and frustrations. Rude drivers, no-shows for costly appointments, miserable customer service, broken promises, wasted hours waiting, last minute cancellations, flight delays, weather changes, traffic jams.....all are so tiny taken by themselves, but when compounded on top of sleepless nights, endless to-do lists, unrealistic expectations, incessant demands....it can all combine to pull our eyes away from the one focus of our entire life - the One lover of our soul - the Creator and Lord over all the universe who spoke it all into existence with his spoken word and then sent His son to die for all our transgressions against Him. When we stop looking up at how big God is, suddenly all the frustrations of the holidays seem enormous. And they all seem somehow unspiritual (yes, I made up that word)...as if we should fight them with human "weapons" instead of donning the armor of God and resisting them with God's word and with prayer.

I enjoy resistance training, but I can't expect to sit on my bum for a month, and then bench press 300#s when the big attacks come. I get the best results when I consistently train each and every muscle group, little by little, every single week. I have to resist the weight, however. I can't just lie under a barbell, defeated. I have to press against it. The little efforts to oppose that weight consistently over time make me stronger and less prone to injury than if I only sporadically lifted weights when I thought I needed strength the most.

 

So all that to say the trivial inconveniences and annoyances in this life have value - eternal value. Disrespect, offense, mistakes, lies, mistreatment, and failures are a given in this life. And while God does not tempt us or make us suffer, He sometimes allows attacks or suffering into our lives, whether big or small, to strengthen us and make us holy and for whatever greater purposes He may have which we cannot see with our finite minds. He wants to redeem that which is broken, worldly, or unjust in our lives, whether it seems spiritual or not. We have a choice, though. We can whine and complain and refuse to draw on God's power to resist it, or we can push back evil with good. We can resist hatred with love, rude behavior with kindness, greed with charity, abuse with compassion, and Satan's lies with God's truth. By relying on God and choosing to respond according to His word, we become stronger in every area of our lives and more like our heavenly Father.

While I often feel like all these irritations waste so much of my limited time on earth, I must remember that nothing is wasted with God. (1 Corinthians 15:58) May we bear it all, both the the little frustrations and the big, awful challenges or extreme persecutions life may bring us, with faith, courage, and hope, resting in His power, presence, and promises, looking not to our own interests but

only to Him.

Keeping Youth Athletics in Perspective

It's very tempting in our society, which has made youth sports out to be some sort of religious cult requiring the most extreme devotion,  to lose sight of the true value of sports activities for our kids. Hopefully we did not get them involved so we could live vicariously through them or with the expectation that they will always win and go pro. It's common to get so caught up in winning, gaining elite skills, and pursuing athletic scholarships (which become a huge burden and a full-time job for the student, often taking priority over studying or attending classes), that we forget that the greatest benefit and reason for putting our kids in sports is for their personal character development.  Sports may shape our kids' lives, but they must not consume their lives. 

Sports activities teach kids to work as a team, putting the interests of the whole above one's own interests. They teach patience, dedication, discipline, and perseverance. They teach respect for authority, respect for one's peers, and respect for the limits of one's own physical body. Sports give young people practice overcoming adversities and expose them to important realities about life such as: life isn't fair; things don't always go your way; you are not the best, and you are not the worst, so stop comparing and just be all that God created you to be!

A few weeks ago, my daughter and a few other 8th graders ran a relay together at their first ever high-school polar bear track meet. It was a new experience, and it was cold! It was humbling running against the older, more experienced high school girls (3 out of 4 girls on her relay team had never run track before at all, and our daughter had only run middle school track one short season). It was a great chance for them to develop courage.

Our daughter ran the anchor leg, and by the time she got the baton for the last lap, at least one high school team had finished, which is not surprising given her team's age and experience. Based on the video her coach sent me, she was at least 200-300 meters behind the next-to-last runner. In real life, when most people see no chance of winning or when they see the large gap between where they are now and where they want to be, they give up. Our girl had already run 3 events, and she certainly couldn't win this one, so why strive to eek out more effort when she was already spent simply to lose anyway? That's a typical response for the "entitled" generations. But youth sports instill a different attitude. They teach kids that giving their very best effort is what matters. Sports inspire the determination to never give up. So my girl took that baton, prayed, and gave it her best effort. And you know what? She didn't finish 200-300 meters behind the next to last runner. In fact, she passed the high schooler who probably never expected our team to come close.

 

You just never know what might happen if you simply give your best, not for the purpose of bringing yourself glory, but only for the glory of God. Those are the types of life lessons that we want our children to gain through their sports activities, and I'm thankful for every single one.