It's In A Safe Place

            

           I am notorious for putting something away in a safe place so I know just where to look for it when I need it!  At the time, it makes perfect sense, but when I’m searching for it, I’m totally at wits end trying to think of what I was ‘thinking’ when I put it away.  

            When I was a child, my parents would laugh when they lost something and then found it, saying, “There it is!  I always find it in the last place I look!”  I suspect my folks weren’t the only ones who made this observation.  But for a child, it seems a bit confusing.  After asking why they’d say that, with a slight giggle, answer, “Well, because once I find it, I don’t have to keep looking!”

            That made sense, and as an adult, those words enter my thought process as I’m searching for my lost item!  Yet all the while, I’m also thinking, “Where’s the last place I’d look?” Hoping that it would indeed be my last place---at the very beginning.  It’s a great approach for items like sunglasses, keys (always the keys!), an important piece of paper, a book, or anything that is a ‘concrete’ item. 

            But what about those intangible items?  Why is it so difficult to find love, faith, happiness, courage, hope, guidance, or even the path we should take?  These ‘abstract items’ can be lost when life throws us ‘under the bus.’  Circumstances such as divorce, the loss of a child, debilitating diseases like cancer, financial difficulties, natural disasters that takes everything they own, those struggling with depression and more can wrack a person’s self-confidence and self-worth to the point of wanting to give up!

Life seems to be spiraling out of control.  We feel totally lost and unable to find our way back to what is right and good.  Where do we look for these non-tangibles?  How can they be found, especially when we can’t even ‘see’ them with our eyes!?

            Often, we search, but just like looking ‘in all the wrong places’ for the tangible, concrete items, we do the same for the intangible ones.  People, frequently become so depressed and filled with despair, they just want to run away and forget.  That can lead to substance abuse, alcohol, or other behaviors that are at first glance the ‘perfect escape,’ but end up in only destruction and disillusionment.  

            God promised he would not give us more than we can bear.  Some would say, given the circumstance, it is more than they can bear and while dealing with other ‘escapes’ believe the best way out is suicide.

            We all have struggles, but we each must choose how we will handle them. Satan and his minions use our choices of free-will to pave the way for some of our difficulties.  Someone else added “the Laws of Physics” are also players in this journey.  Falls that break bones, or accidents that cripple our bodies also create circumstances which cause distress and despair! 

            God promised to be with us through whatever we face.  His grace is what gets us through.  We must claim that promise however, for it to be effective.  When we live in a way that demonstrates anger and hostility at God, forward progression can be difficult.  Negativity has a way of pulling us further under and Satan will jump on the opportunity to hold us down when we give in!

            When we look into God’s Word, we can find the perfect solution for all that is going on in our lives, (even in the current state of affairs of hate, and division).  God can make any bleak situation turn bright and good, when we allow His Spirit to change ours!

(The significance of the photo is, if you look closely, near the first sentence of the second paragraph, to the right of the picture, you'll see an apple a squirrel 'hid' for a later time!)