Magnificent Life When You're Miserable?

How do you live a "Magnificent Life" when life feels downright miserable? Good question and one I've grappled with for as long as I can remember.

I grew up believing that I "should be happy" and that if I wasn't happy than I was either doing something wrong, I wasn't working hard enough or the people in my life were really messing things up for me. I spent a lot of years "working hard," reading self-help books, setting short-term and long-term goals, achieving, performing and trying to "do the right thing" all in an attempt to avoid pain and any form of sadness and stay on a steady stream of success and happiness. It never worked. Inevitably I'd end up in a pit somewhere..depressed and eating anything that resembled a processed carbohydrate that could be washed down with Diet Coke. It was when a friend took the time to explain to me that I didn't need to keep "working hard" to be happy but that what I really needed was the free gift of God's grace that was offered to me through Christ's sacrifice on the cross. My friend told me that while receiving this gift would not ensure unending "happiness," it would indeed secure "eternal life" which in turn would enable me to walk around with consistent JOY.

In God's Word it reads "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith--and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God--not by works, so that no one can boast." (Ephesians 2:8 NIV)

My friend explained to me that by receiving (through faith) this gift of grace, I was now guaranteed eternal life and an eventual home in Heaven and that it had nothing to do with what I did and EVERYTHING to do with what Jesus had done for me and for all mankind.

In the months that followed my decision to receive Jesus Christ's gift of grace and eternal life, I began to learn much through his Word, one of the most freeing things being what Christ said to his disciples in John 16:33 "I have told you these things so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world." This verse spoke such FREEDOM to me because it shattered the set-up that I'd lived out of that told me that "I should be happy" and it replaced it with the truth...while I walk on this earth I can count on the fact that there will be days of "trouble" but that I can "take heart" knowing that Christ is with me in those days of trouble and that He has overcome them.

So back to our question..."How do we live a magnificent life when life is miserable?" We must remember that we are not yet home but that one day we will be. In other words we have to live with an "eternal perspective" and the HOPE that is ours everyday; the Hope that one day we will leave "this world of trouble" and be face to face with Jesus and when that happens we will be absolutely and positively done with pain and suffering. So how do we do that? How do we live with hope and an eternal perspective? We go back to the first two principles from my previous blog entries...we stay connected to God's PEOPLE (friendship) so that we stay encouraged, supported, comforted, loved (and we do the same for others)...and we stay in a posture of PRAYER so that we can be reminded of who God is, how much He loves us and the truth of His unchanging Word.

To be totally honest with you, this season that I am currently in has been filled with some of the most "miserable" circumstances I've ever experienced...illness (my own, my husband, my daughter, my extended family), death of close friends and the grief of their families, conflict in relationships, disappointments for my children, challenges with finances...I imagine that as some of you read this you too can say that there are some really miserable things going on in your life right now as well. So how am I then living "A Magnificent Life"? I am choosing to live this life seeking to "see" God through it and seeking to reflect Him through the circumstances...I am choosing to believe that God is at work (whether I understand it or not), that God is in control and that God is with me (whether I "feel" it or not for He says "Never will I leave you, never will I forsake you" Hebrews 13:5 NIV) and I am looking forward to the day when I will be face to face with the One who is my magnificent life-Jesus Christ. Won't you do the same with me? Take heart dear one...Jesus has overcome the world and He is our Magnificent Life.