out the door

I run from tough stuff. 

I do. 

I don't want to be the person that runs, but I am. 

I pray for brokenness, I pray for humility, I pray for growth, I pray for understanding...and yet I want it all sitting from the comfort of my home.

When the hard stuff comes, I grab my flip flops (because I am not a runner) and I head for the door.

The door is the easy way out. The door doesn't force me to do soul-searching or challenge me to change. The door allows me to run and hide from the hard. 

Beauty and growth and change and God's glory can't be found by hiding in my house or by running out the door. 

These things require me to fully embrace the story God is writing for my life. Sometimes that story is filled with great joy and abundant blessings. And other times that story is filled with change and trust and unknown...and hard. 

It's when we enter into the hard things and face the tough places
that God brings us to a greater awareness of Him and dependence on Him. 

I have been going through some hard stuff and this is what I learned: the hard does not minimize His goodness but allows us to experience His goodness in a whole new way. Do I believe this?  Do I trust that the hard will allow me to experience God's goodness in a whole new way?  If so, why do I run from the hard?

But it's in the tough places, that He teaches me. If life was always pretty and perfect, I wouldn't know how to search for the beauty. Beauty is often wedged between the hard and uncomfortable, adjacent to the difficult.  Do I believe that it's in the tough places that God teaches me? Am I willing to face the hard and uncomfortable and difficult to find the beauty?