Frustrations

I've been trying to give the first half hour of my morning to Jesus. It started out with some struggles as the kids didn't want to cooperate with me at all, but I knew it was something that I really needed to do and I stuck to it. It's not perfect by any means 2-3 weeks later, but it's gotten a lot better.

Anyway, I've been listening to Joyce Meyer everyday on M-F from 7-7:30 and she's been helping so much. God is definitely telling me some things. Joyce was doing a study on living with our frustrations this week. She said that we can't help some of the things that happen to us and we can't make people do things, but we have a choice on how we react to things. She said we need to start praying more before and asking the Lord for help before we get so frustrated that we're angry and we need to start asking Him for what we need to get through it. I've started to do that and I see that it truly does make a difference and I don't get to that frustrated level so easily.

She also said to take a look at your life and see the triggers that make us frustrated. She said maybe there's some things or people that need to be pruned out of your life for awhile. We had some drama from one of our birthmoms this week and I saw how one day I was totally peaceful and the stuff with her started and it totally stole my joy and I was snippy because of it. Joyce's message spoke to me and I prayed for her and for the situation and I have peace ignoring her now. I've said all I'm going to say on the subject to her and she just doesn't want to accept it. All I can do is pray for her now and let God handle the rest. And I need to let it go and quit letting her try to manipulate me into doing what she wants. I'm ok with that now. I have a choice on how I'm going to react to it and I'm not going to let her get to me anymore.

I've been frustrated dealing with some of the behaviors of my children as well and feeling like a failure because we can't seem to get past some of them...my kids just do them over and over and over. Well, Joyce says we're not the potter...God is. We can't change anyone, only God can do that. I finally realized that we can discipline and talk to them about it and stay consistent, but that I have to pray for them more often as well and let God make them into the people that God intended for them to be and that He will bring good to all things.

The other thing that she said that really struck me is that sometimes we just need to hang on the vine for awhile and let God work with us and feed us and we need to quit doing so much. I always feel guilty for not doing more, so just hearing that made sense and helped. It's ok to take time out and listen to what God wants for us rather than feeling like we need to do this, that, and the other thing for everyone else. :-)