We’re here in Denver, Colorado! After spending a little time in Utah with family, we drove on down the road about ten hours. Samuel decided to get carsick along the way. It’s not a family road trip until he does. I have it down to a science now. Just another barf family memory to add to the many others. Thanks son!
One of the best parts about keeping up a website/blog are the wonderful people you meet. When I knew I’d be heading to the MOPS Convention in Nashville, I sounded the alarm. These “Blessed Guests” are authors/speakers/writers and most especially – moms! They will be guest posting from time to time over the next few weeks. If you’ve never met them before, boy are you in for a treat.
You can share your applause for Melissa by Tweeting/”Liking” my Facebook button above/ or sharing her devotion below on your own Twitter/Facebook page!
Joy On The Journey
The Lord is my strength and shield. I trust him with all my heart.He helps me, and my heart is filled with joy.
I burst out in songs of thanksgiving. Psalm 28:7 NLT
There’s something very intersting about the word JOY, let’s face it, there are so many times in our life that there is just so much stuff piling in around us that the very last thing we can think of is being filled with JOY.
According to dictionary.com JOY means; The emotion of great delight or happiness caused by something exceptionally good or satisfying; keen pleasure; elation.
How do you do that when there are bills to be paid, marriages that are struggling, wayward children, jobs in distress and the house that may be taken away from you at any moment?
I am not saying that these things are not hard and exceptionally trying on you mentally, physically and maybe even spiritually, but JOY my dear sisters, in Christ, come not from our circumstances and the storms swirling around us but the Lord who is in us. Joy comes from the Lord and when He brings you that joy you can rest assured that the storms may take you under for a bit but the King of Kings, Lord of Lords will be right there with you with a life preserver in hand.
Over the last few years my family has had more than our fair share of storms in our life, some of them small and some of them downright unbearable. There were days when I thought that we were drowning in the midst of the stuff that was going on around us, but even when those storms were threatening to take us under there was still joy in my heart.
You see, choosing to seek the joy is a conscious decision to say that no matter what comes my way I will stand firm in Him. Certainly not because of the circumstances in my life, but because choosing to SEEK the JOY on this journey called life brings Him glory.
Dear sisters, there is something entirely different about seeking the joy instead of just waiting for it. When you seek it you are making it a verb, which means it requires action. It is not a sit around and hope that it happens to you someday. It is all about going out and looking for it. Seeking the joy doesn’t take away the storms but it certainly does help to put it all into perspective.
Father God as we seek the joy on the journey of life would you guide our hearts to see you in everything we do. We want to be women with joy in our hearts, we want to be women who are actively seeking you, so Father as the storms come and shake us about help us to know that we can have joy even in the midst of it all. We love you, in Jesus name, Amen.
Melissa is a woman who is passionately pursuing God every day by taking her everyday, ordinary life and placing it as an offering to Him. Married to her best friend for 18 years and proud mama to two teenage boys her life is full of adventure. Visit her on Twitter or in Mel’s World with Melissa Mashburn.
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