Happy October!! I cannot believe it is FALL!!! Let’s make the next few months amazing!
This week’s devo is “Bottle Necked” written by Teresa Ross! Please take the time to read as she shares with us today!
Hope you have an awesome week!!!
Bottle Necked – Teresa Ross
Do you ever hold on to things too tightly? I have a terrible tendency to attach emotions to ‘things’! Memories, sweet memories are associated with those things! Sweet memories of people I’ve loved & invested in.
My husband & I married in 1983, & before we met, each of us surrendered our lives to the Lord, to go or do whatever He wanted us to do. We were serving the Lord in a church on the east coast, a day’s drive from our parents, & liked the area we were in. God put it in my husband’s heart to serve in an area where there were not very many good churches. When he told me he wanted us to move to the west coast & serve, that was NOT a day’s drive from our family! Honestly, I struggled! ‘Practical surrender’ is sooo much more difficult than ‘romantic surrender’!! When you read about it in the books, it’s so easy!!! God really had to work in my heart, but He did! We had a 1 year old & I was pregnant with our 2nd daughter. We bought an old school bus & we were on our way. God was faithful!
We served in 3 churches, 1 as assistant pastor & 2 as a pastor. We met many wonderful people & I believe influenced many people for the Lord. Several that were saved are now on the foreign mission field, & many had their spiritual lives strengthened. Many we invested in became a part of our life!
When you serve the Lord together, your hearts knit in a special way. A church God allowed us to help restart in 2004 held special memories for us. God allowed us to purchase a building for it! Memories with the ladies, decorating for different events. You grow to have a special place in your heart for each person. God was faithful!
When we would visit our family back east, or when they would come to visit, we would have such a wonderful time. The laughs, times together. Each moment together was special. We loved to go to garage sales & mom would always help me find treasures that I would see in a different ‘light’! Redoing our dining room chairs was a special memory, thrift shopping, garage sales, just so many things! When I would be home, I could look at that item & remember the memories from that person. Gifts the kids gave us & the events around it. Things in our home that people in our church had given us, & memories of that person!
In 2020, after a lot of prayer, & circumstances which had to come to pass, my husband decided it was time to serve in an area close to where we grew up. My dad had moved on to heaven 13 years earlier & mom was having health issues, basically bed ridden. I was excited at being close to family again, but our adult kids were still on the west coast!! (3 out of 4). We would work in Christian school close by, & would be with mom every other week end. Excitement as well as fear & heartache at being so far away from kids set in!
I started packing our 32 years of ‘living’ & memories – incredibly difficult for me! What went out on a school bus 32 years earlier had GROWN!!! Both of our daughters are ‘minimalists’ & I’m NOT!!! (Remember, I attach emotions to things!). Between packing, selling our beautiful house, saying good bye to our people, relocating across country, starting a new job, all in the middle of the pandemic! God was faithful! Technology had changed so much just in the pandemic!! So a new teaching position & the challenges that come with that, then Covid hit us! God was still faithful!
We were back for 8 months & I was at mom’s spending time with her for during spring break, when God decided it was time for her to move on to heaven. I’m so thankful we were with her! Through the bittersweet moments, God was faithful!
When we arrived back in 2020, we hit the ground running, looking for a place to live, (we ended up moving into our house the first week of school, unpacking, etc), trying to get involved in the new ministry & learn all that was needed, doing all the ‘change overs’, etc, & then the technology changeovers!! Covid changed the way so many things happen! I was taking in more info than I could process!! Ever been in a constant fog? My brain ‘bottle necked’!! Through everything, God has been so faithful! Moments I felt like I was invisible to God, moments I felt so very inadequate to do what I had done so often before! Ever been there? I knew how to cook, had had hundreds of people in our home & cooked for them, but all of a sudden, almost every recipe tasted ‘off’. The most simple tasks seemed like a difficult job! You want to just go to bed & stay there!!
But God was & is faithful!! I kept up with my Bible reading. Perhaps I couldn’t read as much in 1 sitting as before, but I could keep phrases of verses in my head & keep meditating on them. I could keep good, encouraging music on. I could grab a cup of coffee or ice water & sit on our beautiful back porch & just thank God for His faithfulness. Right now we’re waiting on Ian to pass over us within the next few days. Sandbags are in place, soup is made, eggs boiled, tub filling with water (you have to be able to flush!), as far as I know, prep is done.
I did have to take a step back to ‘regroup’ the traffic in my brain! Being bottle necked is real! Psalms 25 has been a source of strength for me. Psalms 25 : 1 – “Unto thee, O Lord, do I lift up my soul.” :2 – ” O my God, I trust in thee: let not mine enemies triumph over me.” Our enemy is Satan. We must not let him win in our lives! He wins if we quit. Ladies, slowing down long enough to ‘regroup’ & gather reinforcements is NOT quitting! I needed to gather reinforcements & regroup because I had become bottle necked. It’s ok! Now is the battle time! :4 – “Shew me thy ways, O Lord; teach me thy paths. :5 – Lead me in thy truth, and teach me; for thou art the God of my salvation; on thee do I wait all the day long.”
Because the Lord loves & cares for each one of us in a personal way, He DOES want to lead us, & help us do the things He wants us to do! He will give us the peace we’re looking for & show us what He wants. Please don’t give up, keep loving the Lord & draw close to Him! People need to see Jesus in us. We may not be as “…………..” whatever, as someone else, but God made us unique, to love Him the way He made us to. He never made us to give up on Him though!
https://www.sappsolutely.com/devotions/bottle-necked-teresa-ross
