Come to me all you who are weary and burdened and I will give you rest.  Matthew 11:28

 I am a positive person, but in this optimistic woman lies someone who can struggle.  Life isn’t always easy, yet I have so much to be grateful for that I can hide my struggles as if they are not worthy of being felt. 

I have a disclaimer I catch myself using whenever I am sharing with a friend. It is “People should have my problems”.  Guilt has a way of minimizing our hurts with “you don’t have the right to feel that way”.

But what if instead of hiding behind an “everything is perfect’ image, we could be vulnerable and transparent about life’s hardships?  

What if instead of pushing our problems aside, in hopes that we would feel different, we went to the healer?

It is so easy to wake up in time to get ready for our day, and race around trying to accomplish one more thing, and be ready to shut down when we get to the end of the day.  

However; what if we quit going through the motions of waking up, meeting needs, checking off responsibilities and falling in bed at night and made Jesus our hiding place?  

What if we broke out a journal and wrote our thoughts, our questions, our hurts, our hangups, our fears, our struggles, and our dreams down, and Gave them to Jesus. 

Forty two of the Psalms (songs of worship) are laments to God.  Things didn’t always go well for the Psalmist, but they sang anyway.  They knew their God was capable of their sadness, and longed for his comfort and peace. They didn’t hide their hurt, fear, and the chaos in their minds.  Instead, they ran to the only one who can fix it.

God can handle our hurts and hangups.

Give yourself grace to feel what you do, and let go of the expectation that you need to act or be a certain way.  Realize you are exactly who God made you to be.  Give yourself grace to be authentic before your God.  It is ok to be angry, afraid, and emotional. Lamenting to God doesn’t mean your ungrateful.  It means you struggle.  And just like Jacob wrestled with God, our cries to Jesus will lead to blessing.

He wants you to come to him.  And when you do, He will give you rest.