Choices...

Everyday we make choices. Good choices and bad choices surround us and navigate through our schema. I have been reminded lately that I can choose to bless The Lord, regardless of my situations. The song "10,000 Reasons (bless The Lord)" has been in my mind all week. The words are powerful yet have drawn me back to the choice we have to worship The Lord in the midst of the junk this life gives us. Life is hard and well...sometimes life sucks. Situations we experience, loss, and disappointment all can suck the life right out of us. Without choosing to turn to Christ in the midst of the chaotic world we live in we can drown in unknowns, comparisons and doubts. Yet we worship a God who is there in the midst of all that junk. 

I'm a recovering over commiting, people pleasing, can't say no-a-holic. This way of life left me burned out. It left me burned out as a social worker. Im not afraid to admit it, it even left me burned out on religion. So instead of commiting to everything like my old ways, I stood on the outskirts, was aloof and hid behind my baby, who had become my security blanket in a sense.

 I used to struggle with wanting to look, talk, and be like everyone else. I thought I had a handle on it until I moved here and yet again wasn't part of the "in crowd" at church. Funny how sometimes we feel the most excluded at church, the one place where everyone should feel like they belong right? I wasn't sure of my place and purpose amongst the people I was called to serve through youth ministry. I could blame it on the nature of ministry, being a pastors wife or even my OCD, but I began looking at it like it was a choice. In reality I was choosing to let the popular people get to me. Choosing to have pity parties and other distructive thought patterns seized my rational brain. 

Tonight I am choosing to bless the Lord. I am choosing to pray when i'd rather complain. I am choosing to read the word daily and being intentional about sharing verses with friends. I am choosing to worship the Lord even though I may not like the songs or music style, or gasp...the platform arrangement on a given sunday. I'm choosing to stop listening to the whiny bad attitdes and start being a part of the change. I am choosing to
tune out the negative "this is how we've always done it or it will never work that way" people so I can hear the voice of the Lord. I'm choosing to give to others even if it means going without. I'm choosing joy.

I am choosing to be fully present in the moment.