3:16/23
Aloha Earth Angel!
How are you doing today?
Is how you feel based on being in the present moment, dependent on expectations of the future, people, and/or faith? And does life usually measure up to what you were believing for?
Recently had the opportunity to consider what ‘expectations’ means to me for a writing assignment. It helped to realized why I’ve missed out on a few of them when they did actually come to fruition, or why I can be let down by them sometimes, and how that can be remedied.
Here’s what I came up with:
Expectations can be a bit tricky . . .
We’re told that if we imagine something we want to manifest into our lives with intensity, tenacity, and consistency, we can expect to receive it.
Yet when I’ve tried to do that, I’ve sometimes missed out on what I was believing for because it showed up in God’s time and ways instead of exactly as how I imagined it ‘should’ and I didn’t recognize it in the moment.
I can expect people to be who I think they should be as opposed to who they truly are, and then get angry or hurt by them because they didn’t measure up to those impossible-because-it’s-not-who-they-are specifications.
We can also assume we ‘should’ be able to do this, that, and the other things finished in specific time frames, then become disgusted because we didn’t get it all done as perfectly as we imagined and when we thought we could.
Some people make offers and promise they won’t keep.
However . . .
When God makes a promise, whether in His Word or our hearts, He always follows through in HIS time and ways.
When we relinquish our desire to completely control our own (and others’) lives and put our hope, faith, and trust in God, we can expect Divine intervention that can exceed any hope we imagined.
We have complete faith in the expectation that because of our Savior Jesus Christ, our sins are completely forgiven and we can let all our guilt and shame go and live in freedom. Our lives are redeemed and we have value and are loved by Him (God!!!!) beyond our comprehension; our hearts are healed and filled to overflowing, and minds are renewed.
We can do more in peace when we rest in Him than we ever could when making ourselves miserable by trying to do in our own strength what God can much more easily do through us.
I guess it all depends on who we expect from; mortals, or our Heavenly Father.
Dear Heavenly Abba –
Thank You that You are the one Being we can have full expectation of being heard by and completely and truly accepted, loved, and Divinely led to our best love and lives.
I surrender my dreams and hopes to You in order to better hear Your expectations of me, which are never too much, too little or not in our best interests.
In Jesus name,
Amen!!!
As for the song of the week, are you familiar with the three Van Zant brothers? Ronnie was the lead singer for Lynyrd Skynyrd until his death in an airplane accident in the 70’s. Johnny And Donnie had their own band for a few years, Van Zant. Johnnie eventually took over the lead singer position for his late brother in Lynyrd Skynyrd and Donnie has been the singer for the band .38 Special. (Got that?:))
Have seen .38 special several times and Lynyrd Skynyrd once (with Johnnie on lead vocals); loved all the shows. “Simple Man” by Skynyrd is my favorite from all their combined song catalogues. Love it so much because it’s so heartfelt and honest, and seems to represent the three humble and ‘what-you-see-is-what-you-get’ type men well. (Ronnie was one of the writers {with Gary Rossington}; this video is relatively recent, so Johnny is singing.)
Picture at the top is byJan Tinneberg, and uploaded from Unsplash.
