The Upper Room Daily Devotionals in Nashville, Tennessee, United States "Climbing Out of the Pit" for Monday, 2 January 2017 with Scripture: 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18

The Upper Room Daily Devotionals in Nashville, Tennessee, United States "Climbing Out of the Pit" for Monday, 2 January 2017 with Scripture: 1 Thessalonians 5:16 Always be joyful. 17 Pray regularly. 18 In everything give thanks, for this is what God wants from you who are united with the Messiah Yeshua.

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In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.[1 Thessalonians 5:18 (KJV)]
When I was a teenager, my brother and my father died within a few weeks of each other. Though the sun shone brightly that summer, my soul felt dark. Within 29 days, our family had been reduced from seven to five. Two chairs at the dinner table sat empty. Hopelessness trapped me in a deep hole.
Since I wasn’t familiar with scripture, I stumbled in darkness for years, trying to climb out of my pit of despair. Then one day, I learned that Paul wrote, “In every thing give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.” I knew that God wanted me to be at peace; but I wondered,
How can I give thanks for tragedy and hopelessness?
Then I scrutinized the verse, as if looking through a magnifying glass. A truth suddenly loomed large. Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians does not command me to feel thankful or to be thankful; I must simply “give thanks.” In this, I see a difference between being thankful for a circumstance and being thankful to God for remaining with us in the circumstance.

God desires that we give thanks as an act of faith and obedience. We can learn to trust that God will walk with us through whatever lies ahead. If we feel ourselves slipping into a pit of sorrow, we can trust that God will hold us up.
Read more from the author, here.

"More from Mary Fran Heitzman"

"Do you still hold fast to your integrity? Curse God and die." That’s the retort Job of the Old Testament heard from his wife when God allowed him to be tested by the loss of all their children, their herds, and their servants. But Job asked, “Shall we indeed accept good from God and shall we not accept adversity?” Then Scripture tells us that Job’s friends came and sat down with him on the ground seven days and seven nights and no one spoke a word to him as his grief was very great (Job 2:9-13).
The summer my brother and father died in separate accidents, just 29 days apart, my attitude toward God was less drastic than Job’s wife's, but far from Job’s faithfulness.
No matter where I was, whether in my upstairs bedroom looking out over the fields, lying in bed at night, or sitting in our old church with its stained-glass windows, I wondered, Why has God abandoned our family?
But after a time, I loosened my grip on anger enough to see what remained. While it was true that two chairs sat empty at our kitchen table, I still had three brothers and our mother. Neighboring farmers helped bring in the autumn harvest. Aunts and uncles called on the phone, came to the house, and brought sandwiches, salads, and cakes. Friends at church reached out with kind words and reassuring squeezes. After the funerals, cousins invited me to sleepovers and girlfriends sensed when I needed to talk. They all listened to me tell the same stories over and over because they understood that repetition was therapy.
I bought a notebook and filled line after line and page after page with questions and frustrations that held no answers. But as my mind slowed to the speed of my writing, grief that I’d stuffed deep into my heart emerged so that I could sort through it one issue at a time. Then when my soul was soothed, I’d put the notes in a drawer until the next time. Eventually I’d take my writing out again to sort through the latest battles and heartaches.
Initially, well-meaning suggestions that I focus on a “new normal” felt impossible to embrace. But during those early years, I gradually saw the wisdom of giving the “new normal” a chance. Accepting change was necessary to moving forward. It was not a betrayal to those we’d lost, but a belief that we would see them again. And a belief that their wish for us would be happiness and peace.
Several decades have passed, and I’m grateful to those who kept me busy, to those who were there to listen, and to those who sensed, as Job’s friends did, that sometimes my pain was so deep there were no words of consolation that could be spoken. But most of all I am grateful to God for his provision during those dark days.[Mary Fran Heitzman]

See pictures of Mary with her dad and brother, here.
"Link2Life for January 2, 2017"

Mary with her dad and brother.

The Author: Mary Fran Heitzman (Minnesota, USA)
Thought for the Day: God walks with me.
Prayer: Dear God, even in despair, help us to give thanks that you walk with us. Amen.
Prayer focus: Someone struggling with depression

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