Perspectives.....

I have really been struggling. Really feeling sorry for myself. Really questioning if I needed to continue on some of the paths I am on. I am really ready to be a stay at home mom who has no other responsibilities but her husband, house and children. The work God has me in right now is very stressful. Stressful in ways I have never known. It is hard to work sometimes when the people you work with don't know all the sides of an issue so they make judgements, etc. I take things way too personally! JOhn tells me that all the time. But I really care what people think about my reputation....not about me, like if I am pretty, or if they agree with me, but that I am honest and trustworthy, etc. But I am learning the closer you walk with God and the more He calls you to serve Him, even people that you think understand, will not understand. So that has made me want to walk out on some things. (I will post more about this as I work through it!) But today I had a wake up call....

I went to a reception for a dear friend of mine who is turning 50. She is a powerful woman in Washington DC and works in Sudan, China and South Korea for the persecuted church. She is amazing! When I was at the reception I met a pastor from Eithiopia who now lives here in America. I was talking to my friend's husband on the way out, and he started telling me about this pastor. He was persecuted in Ethiopia for his faith. He has been jailed 21 times, he was hung upside down and poured boiling oil on him, one of the converts with him had his eyes couged (sp?)out. I just stood there. You read stories about people like that....and I have even heard Brother Yun (Heavenly Man) speak in person. But to be standing there in conversation with someone in your every day life who has suffered that kind of persecution made me stop and think! I had just heard this man pray 10 minutes before this not knowing his testimony. Even with out knowing his testimony, he struck me as such a gracious and thankful person! There was not a hint of bitterness toward God or an attitude that God owed him because of what he had suffered. God must really hate my whiny attitude about my life and how hard it is! It really put things in perspecitve, and I had to spend some time on my knees asking for forgiveness and wisdom to overcome my stinky attitude!