What Appears to be Hardship...

Proverbs 4:10-5:14

Today's assignment in Proverbs reminds me to keep in mind that the "adulteress" in this passage refers to anything that seduces, sucks me in, misleads me, or even corrupts me.  What has caused me to squander days of my life and leave me full of regret? Uhhhhh - there are so many things I regret.  I regret the choice to walk away from living a life in Jesus and the trouble that ensued.  I regret being angry - spending so much of my existence processing everything through this cover emotion.  I regret taking that anger out on my precious husband and the people closest to me. I regret over reacting in general and how foolish I appear to others.  I regret wasting my money on things that I thought would make me happy (materialism).  I regret losing friends because I thought boys were my answer.  This list could go on an on...

Today's passages remind me to stay away from the aforementioned "adulteress." Things of this world like possessions, alcohol, drugs, even some people can lure me away from Jesus.  I love when God keeps hammering away at me.  This idea of idols has come up over and over in our house.  It's easy to remove ourselves from the idea of idols - like they are statues.  But an idol is anything that keeps us away from God; anything that gets more of our attention than God.  I have a million idols - my iPhone, the TV, even my husband and baby, sometimes.  Proverbs 4:23 says, "above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life."  God's Word reminds me that I don't want to live a life of regret wishing I had embraced God's discipline as loving.  Justin and I were discussing this idea that God allows what appears to be discipline or hardship in our lives; but this hardship is actually the act of a loving God.  For instance, a few months ago, Justin and I were really arguing a LOT - like, we were getting concerned to the point of calling in our pastor for some counseling.  In the moment, I could not understand why God wouldn't just repair whatever was going on... I mean, we prayed about it and sought His Word - why wouldn't He just fix it?!  Through our pastor, we discovered that the root of all that arguing was my need to define my role as a wife and mother.  I felt extremely overextended because I was still devoting so much energy to my job.  I'm an extremely intense person and I found it impossible to leave work at work.  It was affecting everything.  Our pastor encouraged us to evaluate what was important.  We had already been discussing my leaving work, but just didn't see a way out.  We had reviewed our budget a hundred times but we NEEDED my income.  We had already eliminated cable, cut groceries (no more organic for the Liebers), and sliced our fun money.  When we looked again, we realized that Justin's truck had to go.  If we didn't have that payment, we could make ends meet... I quit within that week - even before the truck was sold.  The day after I resigned, the truck sold and we had another. That is God, people! So, our Loving God let us have those arguments so that we could ultimately seek His will in my resignation.  Financially, this was a HUGE leap of faith and we were forced to trust Him.  But that season was one of our most fruitful, also.  In our culture, we seek ease and comfort.  You know, everything we do seems to center around looking for a fast and easy way out.  Sometimes, I think we forget the peace of a hard-earned lesson.  Galations 6:9 says, "Let us not lose heart in doing good, for in due time we will reap if we do not grow weary."