It’s Not You, It’s Me

Confession #1: I hate rural living.

I don’t enjoy anything about having to drive 30 minutes to get groceries.

Or when the only option for eating out is the hot food section of the deli at the local grocery store.

Or when there are more pickled and fried things at the grocery store than produce.

Seriously, it just isn’t for me. (Can you tell the only thing I have done this week has to do with groceries?)

I love walking to the store, having tons of options for good (and even healthy *gasp*) food, and knowing a library is just down the road.

You know where people rarely put campgrounds? In civilization.

We have spent the last week staying in a campground on the OUTSKIRTS of a town of 156 people.

Just saying that makes me want to cry.

Confession #2: I have not been a particularly good sport about the whole experience.

Scott has been busy helping a friend of ours repair his new house. That’s the whole reason we are here… you know, in the middle of nowhere.

I have been busy feeling sorry for myself that we have no cell service and barely any Internet.

And that the playground is far from being toddler-friendly.

And mostly that it’s stupid hot and humid here in no man’s land.

I had to stop and remind myself that my last post was basically telling people not to feel sorry for us because we love our life.

And here I am feeling sorry because I don’t love our life this week.

Coincidence? I don’t think so.

One of the biggest lies out there is that God won’t ask you to do something you won’t like. 

It just isn’t true.  My evidence? Jesus.

Yup, even perfect Jesus didn’t want to do everything  God told Him to do.

Matthew 26 paints a picture of a Jesus begging God to not be brutally beaten and then die on the cross. But unlike some of my recent pleas, Jesus ends it with “Yet I want your will to be done, not mine”. (Matt 26:39, NLT)

That is the perfect example of submission. Jesus wasn’t just begrudgingly obeying God. He was wholeheartedly on board with the plan, even though it wasn’t what He wanted to do.

There is a heart difference there. My heart, my attitude, hasn’t been one of submission to God’s will. It’s been way more like my sometimes tantrum-prone two-year-old: NOOOOO!

Confession #3: This is my issue to fix, not God’s. 

The solution isn’t for God to move us to the next place. If I don’t make a change, then I’ll just end up having another grumpy week somewhere else.

(You know what does love rural living? Tornadoes…  We spend way more time in the middle of nowhere than I would like because of it.)

The real solution is for me to get my heart in the right place. Submission is about my heart, not just my will.

What do you need to work on this week to get your heart in line with what God has for?