Worry and Fear

Worry and Fear.

These two words have incredible power in our lives.

Since I live in a foreign country, my fears might look different than yours, but I think that it is safe to say that we all are faced with worry and fear.

We all have our own fears to face on a daily basis. If you're a mom, that gives you built in fear right there!! If your kids are in the toddler/preschool phase, we have the fears of our children's safety, and the constantly wondering if our less-than-perfect mothering is going to mess these kids up for life (er, maybe that's just me).

If your kids are a little older, you've got puberty, drivers licenses, college, the opposite sex, and probably even future sons or daughters-in-law. Yikes!!

There are still other fears in our lives, it could be fears about our children's health, financial fears, or depression. It could be fear for your marriage, or the fear of failure in your work or life. We have fears and insecurities bombarding us every single day. It's not a matter of if we will have them, but it's a matter of what we will choose to do with them.

I don't know about you, but I find it easy to trust in things other than God, sometimes without even realizing it. Things like our spouse, a close friend, our mom, maybe even the Almighty Dr.Phil, or whoever is popular in America these days. I'm no different than the next girl...I find myself trusting in these things more often than I should. Is God and His Word the first thing we run to in hard times? It sounds so cliche', but He should be.

It isn't always easy to trust Him. In fact, it can be down right hard!! But, if you think about it, each time you actively choose to trust God, instead of relying on your own strength, you are bringing God glory!!

Yes, there are plenty of things for me to worry about here!!! I worry about lots of things. My husband is a pilot, I worry about his safety every day as he flies. I worry about my mom who is very ill. I worry that my children will turn out to be strange "3rd culture kids", not fitting here, or there. And, yes, I worry about snakes (spitting cobras to be exact)!

However, I think it is the best place I could be. Why? Because when I am fearful, I can run to my Heavenly Father's arms and know that His grace is sufficient for me. And as the verse says,

"My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness. Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore, I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ's sake: for when I am weak then I am strong." 2 Corinthians 12:9-10

God's power is perfected in our human weakness. The weaker we are the more glory He gets through our trusting in Him!! This way, our lives, even in our weaknesses can be for His glory.

How about you?
What do you find yourself running to in times of fear and worry?

What could you do to remind yourself to run to the Heavenly Father first in times like these?

In Him.....Joy

come visit me here...

photos courtesy of allposters.com

Who's Measuring Stick Are You Using?

Who's measuring stick are you using?

The Lord your God is with you, He is mighty to save. He will take great delight in you, He will quiet you with His love, He will rejoice over you with singing.
Zephaniah 3:17

If you are measuring yourself by the world’s standards, you are sure to have judged yourself unkindly. Sometimes we feel that we don’t measure up, that we lack that certain something that it seems that everyone else has. If we only had that look, wore her size, had her connections, or had her qualities we would somehow be all right. Well, I want to bring some reality to you today….God does not require anything more of us than what we are right now in order to be acceptable to Him. Not only acceptable to Him, but cherished by Him. He has called us to be His right now, right here, today. We are exactly the person that He started out to create, and He did it for a specific purpose, and He didn’t mess up! We are covered with Christ’s blood, and we are perfect and acceptable to our Lord and Father!!

When you step away from the world’s standards, you are able to see clearly God’s view of you. You don’t need to look far, it’s practically on every page of His Holy Word.
God sees tremendous value in each one of us. When we are in Christ, we are an unstoppable force for His kingdom…just by being who He made us to be!

Now, if you are anything like me, I can start the day with a clear understanding of who I am in Christ, and yet by the end of the day, I can feel totally worthless. What happened? Well, in short, when I look to myself and my own works to be “good enough”, I will fall short every time. The only good in me is of Christ, and without Him all of my best efforts are as filthy rags (Isaiah 64:6). Only when we fully grasp how totally worthless we are without Christ, will we be able to fully accept how acceptable we are to God with Christ! I know it sounds funny, it certainly goes against the self-talk of our day and age. And yet, it is so freeing. Knowing exactly who we are in Christ can be the most freeing thing you and I will ever experience.

When we begin to use the world’s measuring stick, we will never measure up. However, when we use God’s measuring stick, as He sees us through the blood of Christ, we can’t go wrong. We are the chosen, beloved, cherished daughters of the Almighty King! And, we measure up!

Questions to ponder:

1. What do you think? Have you seen a difference in your life between when you are judging yourself by the world’s standards as opposed to Christ’s?
2. Can you think of a circumstance or an area of your life where you have tried to measure up on your own? What has been the result?

In Him......Joy


Come visit me....


photo courtesy of flickr

They Are Watching

"Hello Mister" is the usual phrase that I am greeted with in this city. It is not uncommon for me to hear this phrase ten times in one day! I am often tempted to call back some rude comment like, "Don't you know that I am not a mister?" or "Don't they teach you any other English phrase besides that one in school?" (I bet you had no idea missionaries could be so carnal!) These things are terrible to say, and I'm thankful that God has allowed me to keep my tongue in check thus far.

As one of only 15 white people on an island of 125,000, I tend to stick out. Everyone wants to know where I am going and what I am doing. Everywhere I go, I am being watched. And I am all too aware of that fact.
However, the truth of the matter is that we, as Christians, are all being watched. As we live our lives, we are a testimony to our relationship with Him, and His power living inside of us. A hurting, needy world is watching us to see if the message of the Gospel is real, and if it really works.
A great quote (that Lori shared last week) from St. Francis of Assisi is this,"Preach the Gospel at all times, when necessary use words." This isn't to say that we should never use words to preach the Gospel. Certainly not. However, if our actions leading up to our words are preaching an entirely different message, how can we expect others to believe what we say about our Lord?

We are to be the "fragrance of Christ" everywhere we go, and to whomever we come in contact with.

I'd say that I have it easy. Knowing that I am being watched has kept me on my toes, and kept me smiling, when sometimes I want to frown. Our testimony to others should be a real one, I'm not suggesting that we put on a fake smile or pretend we are something we aren't. What I am saying that we should be aware of everyone who is watching us, whether it is at the store, the park, or church.

We need to think about how we are presenting Christ to the world....because they are watching.

"Let you light so shine before men that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven. " Matthew 5:16


In Him.....Joy

above photo courtesy of Flickr

Overwhelmed!

Right after breakfast is bath time for my one-year old twins, Tanner and Tyler. There is no better time to wash oatmeal and mashed bananas down the drain than first thing in the morning. When they are finished there is a process to getting them out of the tub.


This is how it works; first I drain the tub, then I run a towel-covered Tanner to the living room carpet, and then run back to get Tyler, who is still in the (empty) tub, and bring him back for a diapering/dressing fest. Only this morning, much to my surprise, when I ran back to get Tyler out of the tub, in the 3.5 seconds I had been gone, he "did his business" in the tub! Great, I thought. Now I'll have to clean up this big mess, but no time, I've got to run back to the living room. And, yet another surprise awaited me....Tanner had "done his business" on the only square foot of carpet in the house!

At this moment I was tempted to crawl back under those covers I had left and call it a day! However, that wasn’t going to be happening, it wasn’t even 7 am yet! I still had 3 other kids to feed, clothes to wash, beds to make, and who knows how many countless other messes to clean up. I sank to the floor, feeling completely overwhelmed. How was I going to get through this day, let alone the rest of the week? I wish I could say that feeling overwhelmed is a once and done thing. However, for me, it is a near every day occurrence!

And yet, I am so thankful that I have a faithful God who lovingly whispers in my ear, “You can do it”, picks me up and dusts me off, only to do the same thing again 30 minutes later. Our God is a faithful God, and His mercies are new every morning….and every afternoon, evening, and night! Lamentations 3:23 says, “Your mercies are new every morning, great is Your faithfulness Lord unto me.” He is not only faithful to give us new mercies, but He is abundantly generous with His strength as well.

“He gives strength to the weary, and to him who lacks might He increases power,
though youths grow weary and tired, and vigorous young men stumble and fall. Yet
those that wait on the Lord will renew their strength. They will mount up with
wings like eagles, they will run and not grow faint, they will walk and not grow
weary.” Isaiah 40:29-31

These are life giving words! Whatever tasks we face along the way (babies pooping on the floor seems pretty insignificant to the real trials of life) we can rely on HIS strength to get us through all of it. Big or small, God is there, through every overwhelming circumstance that comes our way. And He will be there again and again and again. So, I’m going to pick myself up from off of the floor, and look to Him for strength to start again…right after I get four little chubby hands out of the garbage can.

In Him......Joy

I'd love to have you visit me at my personal blog, Joy in the Journey.

Joy Forney

Joy is a daughter of the King, saved by His grace alone. She is also the proud wife of a missionary pilot, as well as the blessed mommy to five. She and her family live on the island of Tarakan in Indonesia, where they serve as missionaries. Joy loves living overseas and loves her simple life, although she could do without the snakes.

Joy stays busy caring for her husband, keeping a home, seeking to live out an authentic example of a follower of Christ before her children, and chasing her very active one-year-old twins.

In her spare time, Joy enjoys reaching out to her friends and neighbors, reading, and putting down her thoughts at her personal blog, Joy in the Journey. Joy loves to encourage women to find joy and contentment in the "mission field" right inside their home....their family. While Joy's life is full of the mundane as well as the unexpected, she wouldn't trade any of it.