I’m so frustrated with where I’m at.

So churned up, eyes so blurry with stored-up storms that I can’t see where I want to be; can’t even work on how to get there.

I am a cup always filling with unspilled anger, precariously balanced.

I am a city holding fire.

I am so preoccupied with external assaults, I offer poor management to the internal blaze. In the end, I will be an intact wall with nothing left to guard. I will have swallowed up anything that was worth protecting in my own collapse.

I am in ruins.

I was mad that my knee has been getting worse, then as I paid for physical therapy this morning, I looked over to see a man smiling about some candy he’d just found, as he stood at the same counter as I, with one less leg.

I explained how frustrated I was about our finances to my physical therapist this morning. She told me she’s working on paying off over $200,000 in student loans.

I was upset that we’re down to one good car and can’t afford new windshield wipers for it, when the old, brittle ones cleared enough of the windshield for me to see someone walking home in the snow.

For all the tension I feel over what I don’t have…I have SO MUCH!!

Lord- You have always taken good care of us. It is a choice to think that I have enough. It is a bad decision to give in to feelings that I don’t.

To feed a fire that only burns my own heart.

“Devote yourself to prayer with an alert mind and a thankful heart.”

–Colossians 4:2

NKJV uses the word “vigilant,” another version says, “being watchful and thankful.” I think it takes a measure of watchfulness to remain thankful.

Perhaps it is not to the outside I must be alert and vigilant, but toward my own heart.

I must be quick to put out the fires on the inside, for what lies outside these walls is not the only danger.

“I was pushed back and about to fall, but the Lord helped me…I will not die, but live, and will proclaim what the Lord has done.”

–Psalm 118:13, 17

“Be earnest and unwearied and steadfast in your prayer [life], being [both] alert and intent in [your praying] with thanksgiving.”

–Colossians 4:2 (Amplified)

So I will not become weary in asking for what I need; I will not grow dejected when I feel pushed back again and again. I will not say you have abandoned us when I am teetering. I will trust in You still.

I will not look at the money, I will look at You.

I will not look at the conflicts, I will look at You.

I will not look at the damage, I will look at You.

You will steady me. You will douse the flame.

Help me develop a watchful mind that is aware of small fires I have allowed to burn. Help me be diligent to talk to you often, faithful to tend to the inward battle, assured that you will handle the outside threats, slow to worry, purposefully thankful.

Time to move on from what I don’t have, what I can’t do. Onward to what is still possible.

Shape me into someone who is thankful, looks forward, speaks gently, and is not consumed with what is lost, because she knows all losses have purpose when they are brought to your feet.

You have a way of taking pieces and doing things I’d never expect with them. There’s a lot that’s in pieces for me right now…help me to let go. To trust you with them. To thank you for them.

Help me to let go of what I had and push into who I am. To see that who I become is a gift you give with hard experiences-a gift to thank you and ask you for. Take whatever you must, to get to who I am and work on that. It could really use your attention.