Ecclesiastes 3:1

“There is a time for everything and a season for every activity under the heavens.” –Ecclesiastes 3:1

Along with accepting and allowing God to heal me from my past, throughout most of month 3 (Kosovo), I was struggling with the fact that God not only has a plan for me, BUT that all my desires are meant to be formed into his desires. I had trouble trying to understand what this meant, and I’m willing to bet that I’m not the only one who has wondered that at some point in your life. Yes, God knows the desires of our heart, and he wants to fulfill them, BUT he wants to do so in his own way, in his BEST way! He wants us to shift our desires into knowing that, even if they change slightly, or we don’t get what we had been expecting in the EXACT way we were expecting it, it is STILL good. His will is always better; this doesn’t mean that it will get easier to accept it and allow him to take our desires, forming them into his own, however.

My third tattoo is a picture of a balancing scale, the image normally representing the astrology sign of a Libra, with the Libra’s constellation appearing behind the scales. Normally when you see a scale, you automatically think of the word ‘balance’; and that is what it represents to me, only, it’s a balance of trust AND patience in Him. He was teaching me how to let go, to truly let go; he was showing me that worrying about a situation/situations you cannot hope to change only makes you miserable, that worrying doesn’t actually serve a purpose when it comes to fully trusting and remaining patient in Him. If we actually trust God with our whole heart, then why do we catch ourselves worrying about our future so often? Why do we see something another person has, thinking that WE deserve that, even that we deserve it MORE than them? Who are we to judge what our neighbor has, or even to be envious of them for having what we want!

“Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself (meaning, God will take it, so there’s no need to worry). Each day has enough trouble of its own.” –Matthew 6:34

As far as the placement goes, it’s on the inner part of my left lower arm, close to my elbow. Why? As a reminder of course, to always place my trust in Him regardless of the worries Satan tries to place in my head. It serves as a reminder to surrender all of my thoughts, all of my anxious worries to God because when you raise your arms in surrender to God, you tend to raise them with your inner arms turned toward the sky! Not only can I see it easily, but it serves as a reminder to always turn to God when I’m not sure of a certain road, a certain pathway that I could take as I come to a fork along the path He has for me. But, it also serves as a reminder to find the joy in every situation, not just the easy ones. Trials are hard because they are meant to grow us, but if we don’t place our sights on God as we go through said trials, who knows where we could end up.

We need to make it a point to find joy in each and every circumstance, good and bad. God never promised us a life free from evil and temptation; take Job for example. A man who did nothing wrong, a man who dedicated his life wholly to God, even while God stripped away everything the man loved. He took his job, his money, his land and livestock, his reputation, his health, even his family and yet, Job still came humbly, ON HIS FACE IN THE DIRT, before Him, taking responsibility for whatever he had done wrong in order to deserve all of what he had taken away from him. God ended up blessing him later with abundance, seeing how truly obedient and humble Job determined to be in spite of everything God had taken from him. I don’t know about you, but I strive to be that humble.

A question to ponder over: what would you do if God took everything away from you? If one day, you woke up and you had nothing; almost as if your life had been scrubbed clean, and you had absolutely nothing, completely vulnerable and alone, with the exception of God by your side. Would you denounce your faith, maybe even denounce God? Or would you THANK Him for the fact that you were still alive, that you would still humbly serve him even if you didn’t have anything else, in that moment or possibly ever? Would you be able to still, willingly, say yes to him; or would your ‘yes’ suddenly become a ‘no’?

“’Has not my hand made all these things, and so they came into being?’ declares the Lord. ‘These are the ones who are humble and contrite in spirit, and who tremble at my word.’” –Isaiah 66:2