Unshackled Moments ~ August 28 ~ Holding Onto Progress

August 26 is historically a difficult day for me, as are the days near it. This year wasn't too bad, but the dull ache still rose up to greet me whenever it could, and so in some ways this weekend was rough. But Leah and I had safe travels and the opportunity to spend time with family. That was wonderful. I felt so blessed to be able to take Leah and be with her as she visited with some of her siblings. It was the first time the three of them were together at the same time in years, and I am grateful for it.  It was a wonderful and amazingly blessed weekend.

Life is like that more often than not. It's never totally perfect and wonderful.  Pleasure often has a hint of pain seasoning it. Sweet and sour mix together on a regular and daily basis. It is part of the spiritual journey to learn to accept the pain without bitterness and while continuing to give God praise and glory and to rejoice in the pleasure without selfishly chasing after it. Gratitude helps us to keep our eyes open for those things we can praise and thank Him for. And one of the areas of gratitude that give us hope is found in the idea of progress rather than perfection. We see the areas of bondage progressively falling away,  we see our shortcomings being removed day by day as we are changed and transformed day by day from glory to glory.

Especially in the early days of freedom and recovery we cling to t he concept of progress as we see with how far we have come, how much better our life is, how much less we are doing those things that once had full control over us and rejoice, rather than kicking ourselves and feeling like failures because we didn't instantly become perfect in every way upon surrendering to God.  This concept is an element of grace, and it is a beautiful and wonderful treasure, a gift from God.

So, naturally, the enemy would like to take it away from us and twist it into a weapon to use against us. I rejoice Friday and throughout the weekend with how much amazing and miraculous progress had been made in an area that was a heartbreak about five years ago. I had gratitude and joy over this situation. But then something happened that didn't even really involve me, and when I saw it, it altered my perception of things. I realized that not as much progress had been made as I had at first believed.

The truth is that progress, great progress, has indeed occurred. But not as much as it first appeared. My initial reaction to the realization was discouragement. I had been overly hopeful. I had fooled myself. I hadn't been seeing the truth of things. There wasn't as much progress as I had rejoice over, so all the progress should be negated or at least downplayed to barely there and nothing to shout about. That's how I felt, at first. That's a common reaction when we look for progress, find it and then see a shortcoming, failure or problem in that area that reduces the progress we thought we had attained.

It's a lie. We need to hang onto the truth. I thought I found $100 on the ground, but when I looked more closely I saw it was a $10.  I don't throw a fit. I don't cry over it or decide I shouldn't be grateful for the $10. I certainly don't throw it away because it's not as much as I thought it was. It's $10 I didn't earn and didn't have before that I do have now. It's $10 closer to the $100 I need. It's progress worth praising over, even at only 10% of what I at first thought.

Don't throw away hope, gratitude or the gift of freedom we have been given when progress is revealed to be less than we originally thought. It's not failure. It doesn't make the progress we have been given worthless. Cling to the joy we have over what we have been given and do not allow disappointment to cause to throw our freedom away and put ourselves back in the chains that have been removed.



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