She Reminds Me To Breathe and I Want to Tell Her to Shut Up

(And I totally correct my kids when they say “shut up.”)

Maybe you’ve joined me on the 2020 wave of online workouts? 

The hubs and I have used different apps to work out from home for several years now.  

My sister is currently offering online workouts on a fantastic membership site if you want to check it out! She likes to say “Good things come to those who sweat.” 

The tough thing about working out is… it’s hard. I usually don’t want to do it. 

I don’t want to get out of bed, spread out a mat, do planks and push-ups and burpees and bear crawls.  

And sometimes this gal with an interesting foreign accent (not my sister) has us doing these crazy hard things. And she’s doing them at the same time.

She jumps like twice as high as me. 

And makes it all look effortless. 

And she’s not even breathing hard. 

We’re in some awkward reverse plank or other and I’m sweating and fighting to stay afloat, and I think she’s going to bust out a Julie Andrews song or something. 

She reminds me to breathe and I want to tell her to shut up. 

(Again — not my sister!)

This week Proverbs 19 reminded me about the fear of the Lord. “Fear of the Lord leads to life, bringing security and protection from harm,” verse 23 says.

On the surface you might think — isn’t it odd that we should be scared of God?

But I think this verse is saying the exact opposite thing. 

When we are fully convinced of God’s love for us (Henri Nouwen so elegantly explained that we are His Beloved) we start to believe that His will and His ways are always, hands-down the best possible option.

So we fear stepping outside of His will because we believe that being the all-knowing God who is wise beyond compare, if we choose to follow His lead, we can trust Him to work things together for our good.

Will our lives be daisies and sunshine ad infinitem? No. We will experience hard times and hard places. But we will experience them trusting He is with us in those valleys, and He is the God who will see us through.

What an eye-brow crunching thought this was for me this week: that so many people go their own ways, make their own choices, take no heed to the wisdom of God for their lives, and then are so angry at Him when things begin to unravel.

God invites us to revere Him, and stand in awe of His complete other-ness. His greatness. All those incredible things He explained to Job that made Job reply, “I am unworthy! I put my hand to my mouth! How can I reply to You?”  

Sometimes God invites us to do hard things. It’s tough, the paths He calls us to are often not the easiest.

But He sees the whole picture. He leads us to the paths that truly do bring life and security and protection from harm. 

Good things come to those who sweat, yes, it’s true.

And? Good things come to those willing to take the hard road, the narrow path, the way that is an invitation from Jesus.

P.S. How to Crush it as a Newbie Homeschooler started last week and we are having fun! If you missed the chance to sign up but you’re interested in hearing when it opens again, pop your details into this form right here!!