March 12, 2004
Who's In Charge?
It was a hard day for me and I am sure a harder one for Woody, who acts like he is going through life picking daisies and singing "tra-la-la-la-la". He picked up he last paycheck from the storage place...and has nothing lined up. He was given some leads but he told me that "he would follow them up next week...". He has become like the men here or the guys that I knew while in the ministry, when it comes to working...always.. "Yea I will pray about it and/or think about it." Tomorrow becomes the next and the next day. Its going to bite him in the butt I think soon, or kill me in the process, from sheer nervous tension.
One of Woody's pet peeves is my family. My alcoholic, workoholic father...My co-dependent, controlling scheming mother...My do nothing amount to nothing brother and my life which he sometimes denigrates as he compares it to his own. "When I was this age I was doing this or that"... I remind him that before I was 26 I had been the daughter of a mad genius, married to a mad genius, had a business and a career, and was considered by many to be the most enviable of women. It meant nothing and was nothing... I had at that time only a "head knowledge" of God. Once I became a Christian, thats truly when what I did in life had value...
I also learned that if you want something you have to go out and get it yourself. Story of my life. I have "Prayed and Worked" my whole life...Know I am stuck dependent on someone who promised to help and take care of me but sees that as a burden too hard to bear and that I am wrong to expect my husband to be the provider. Its horrible, shameful, un-biblical and frightening. Thank God we don't have kids... I am not sure what to do other than pray and hope that Woody does more than look at the paper and complain about the overt racism here.
I have been tempted to scream at God, "how could YOU do this to me?" I haven't yet and I read this devotion by Elisabeth Elliot today and I was encouraged to try to stay calm in the middle of the storm.
The people of Israel complained loudly against Moses for having brought them out into a wilderness where there was nothing to their liking. "Better to have died in Egypt!" they said.
"It was the Lord who brought you out," Moses told them(Ex 16:6-8). "It is against the Lord that you bring your complaints, and not against us."
When we are angry or offended, let us be careful to note where our real complaint lies. This person who insults me at the office or on the bus, this husband who rides roughshod over my feelings, this insensitive individual who does not understand or appreciate me--is he not one whom God has put in my life for my good? Who, after all, is really in charge?
Let us beware of rebellion against the Lord. Circumstances are of his choosing, because He wants to bless us, to lead us (even through the wilderness) out of Egypt, that is, out of ourselves. Settle the complaint with God, and it will settle other things. Be offended with God, and you will be offended with everyone who crosses your path.
I know that God wanted me to marry Woody. I know that God wants us in Hawaii and I also know that you often go through trials that are not really about you but about someone else. I am learning in all of this but I know that this is the first time Woody has not had anything to fall back on and that at 55 he has to stand on his own two feet and make this work. I can only do what I am doing and nothing more.....
Woody can replay for Unemployment in late April. No more extentions are in the pipeline. I have no reserves from the business and spent all of my savings on the move to Waianuenue...
Im just glad that Its not cold here.....
