"Do You Not Trust Me?"

 I swear, I've had so many instances recently in my life, in which the Lord has shown me and revealed to me that I need to give him my full trust in every aspect of my life. Saying I trust Him isn't the same as actually trusting Him. I have to lay down 100% of my life, not 99.8%. It all belongs to Him.

     My family situation hasn't been super great since I got married last year. There's no need to go into it, but the point is that I've had a hard time giving my relationship with my family (parents, brothers, grandparents, etc) up to the Lord. I find myself (back then and present day) trying everything in my power to fix that relationship and feeling guilty about it. 

Why didn't this work? What's another way of going about this? Did I do something wrong and that's why it didn't work? Do they not want a relationship with me because of something I did or didn't do?

I blame myself when it's not about that. The Lord hasn't restored that relationship for who knows why - but it's not up to me to fix it. The Lord will restore that relationship when He wants to. It's my job to focus on him and where He has me now. My job is to stay in prayer and to trust that God will take care of it. He may be protecting me from something or maybe He's trying to teach me (and/or my family) something before this relationship is restored. I honestly don't know. But I do know that it's not my job to fix it. It's my job to trust God.

        My finances are also an area of my life that I've had a firm grip on. I didn't realize how firmly I was holding onto it until the Lord asked me to give it up. It's not that Elijah and I have no money or we're in terrible debt or anything - but after being told by so many different people that our jobs wouldn't pay the bills or we need college degrees in order to get a good job and a good paycheck - those words can creep into your mind when you're not looking. And it can do some damage. So, after a year of marriage and expenses, I didn't realize how hard I was holding onto money: making more, stress of not having enough, etc. I didn't think it was bad cuz my mindset was coming from good intentions. I wanted to make a little extra cash on the side to help my family. I just wanna bless my husband. He works so hard + I wanna relieve that burden by taking on more and earning a little more than I do now. Though I had good intentions, I was doing it alone. I didn't talk to the Lord or ask my husband. I got stressed and anxious + tried it on my own. That wasn't the answer.

     Funny story is that all my ideas were immediately shot down. I tried making my photography more of a priority: I had one photoshoot and that's it. Opportunities were few and so I stopped. I tried selling embroidery t-shirts and after selling two over the course of 6 months, that also came up dry. I tried offering myself for extra hours at my job to do some things + I wasn't needed cuz they found an alternate solution. I was getting frustrated about it one day after work, asking the Lord "Why?? I'm trying to help my family, why isn't anything working? Why does nobody want what I'm offering? Should I try a different approach?" and I heard the Lord say Do you not trust Me? and it was like a ton of bricks on my heart. I'm trying to make extra money on my own strength. I didn't even think to ask the Lord for help, much less if I should actually do anything. He's showing me Himself and just asking me to trust Him. I don't have to have it all together or completely stop thinking about these things. But I do need to give it to Him. Only when I fully surrender these areas of my life, will He be able to use them in incredible ways. Only when I surrender it to God, will He bless it.

     So let me help you the way I needed it. Don't try doing it on your own. Cuz it won't work. Only when you fully surrender to God, will you have peace. It's not enough to say you surrender, you actually have to surrender it to Him. Stop stressing about it or writing up lists or ideas on how to fix your problems. Take your problems to God and let Him help you with them. Cuz if you try doing it on your own, you will fail. You'll end up exhausted and frustrated. I promise that taking it to God is the better option. He wants to help you, but you have to be willing to give up your crap first.

Matthew 6:25-34
Proverbs 3:5-6
1 Peter 5:7
John 14:1
2 Corinthians 5:7

Always,
Becca