an obvious epiphany

I've been pondering a lot of things lately. Last week I was feeling very melancholy, like there was a grey cloud over my head just floating around. Work was unexpectedly stressful. And, actually, life in general was a little overwhelming. Then there was all the coverage of the financial crisis, which got me to worrying about my parents and their financial security. Then on top of that, I started thinking about all the people I knew experiencing some kind of pain---physical, mental, or emotional. Basically, last week was one large ice cream sundae of worry and fear and stress.

But luckily, this sundae melted. I had a realization last Friday and it was quite simple really. Embarrassingly simple. I realized that DUH, God never promises us that life will be easy. However, I have grown so accustomed to life being easy that when life becomes a little tumultuous I freak out. But there is the choice we all have, to dwell in the fear or to move forward knowing that our hope in God will guide us through the fear. The only promising option is to choose the latter, and so now this week I have a renewed sense of optimism. Not because everything suddenly got better---uncertainty and stress and all that fun stuff is still there. But as Corrie ten Boom said, once you "trust an unknown future to a known God", everything seems much easier to handle.