When the Body Says No is the title of a book I’m reading by Gabor Maté, MD. Natural approaches to health and nutrition fascinate me, plus I’m trying to figure out some stuff with my health, and this book intrigued me. In it, Dr. Maté stated, “While it is true that genuine joy and satisfaction enhance physical well-being, ‘positive’ states of mind generated to tune out psychic discomfort lower resistance to illness.” 

What?! I had always been taught to think positive for better health outcomes. (I’ll wait as you read his statement again.)

Dr. Maté goes on to say, “The more [a person] tunes out their anxiety via ‘positive thoughts,’ denial or daydreaming, the longer that stress will act on them and the more damaging it will be. When one lacks the capacity to feel heat, the risk of being burned increases.”

Whoa… I’ll be chewing on this one for a while. I don’t know about you, but now I’m conflicted. I thought there was power in positive thinking.

But wait! Ecclesiastes 3:1 reminds us that, “There is a time for everything and a season for every activity under the heavens.” Furthermore, in verse 4 it says, “A time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance.” When Solomon wrote this he must have realized that God understands us, and that we all experience seasons of life, ups and downs, good times and bad. The key is that whatever it may be, God desires to be in it with us. 

I recall a time in 2019 when I had to have chemo for breast cancer. The night before I laid in bed crying because I didn’t want to do it. Since the staff at the hospital had previously shown me the area I’d be in during the chemo, I tried to imagine myself there. I envisioned my mom in a nearby chair while I sat in the recliner as the nurse did what she had to do. The area was incredibly tight, so I couldn’t figure out where I’d imagine Jesus sitting. In that moment, He spoke to my heart and said, “Shawna, I won’t need a spot because my Spirit lives within you. Whatever you go through, I will experience also.”

Maybe when we are upset, God wants us to stop denying it, and express it, feel it. Cry! Goodness gracious, just get it out! Cry out to God about it. There must be a sort of healing that takes place when we acknowledge and express our pain rather than crookedly slapping a smile over it. It’s liberating to ponder this possibility and actually realize it must be ok to dwell for a bit in sorrow and weep with God. 

OK, so maybe you’re thinking about James 1:2-4 that says, “Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.” 

The joy resides in the fact that in the midst of our troubles, we have Jesus! He can use our pain to grow us. It’s not about ignoring the pain, it’s about recognizing it for exactly what it is. Then with the help of the Holy Spirit, growing through it. I wonder if when broken down to its simplest form, man’s greatest sadness comes from his greatest weakness – his mortality. That being said, then might the believer’s greatest joy come from our greatest strength – eternal life with Jesus!

Pray with me: Father, thank You for continually speaking to my heart about things that are important. Sometimes I am persuaded by the ways of the world in such a subtle way that I’m oblivious to the fact that I have been influenced. Help me to have discernment in my daily walk. On occasion, there are ideas expressed that sound beneficial, but I realize if You are not at the core of them, any true benefits aren’t really there at all. You are holy and good. Thank You for having understanding that is beyond what I can fathom. Somehow, it’s a relief to my soul that You expect that I will feel sadness and negative emotions at times, and that it is OK! The joy is found in the fact that You are right there with me as I feel such things. It’s from there that I can express it, and give it to You. As I endure such things with You, I realize the power isn’t in the positive thinking, it solely resides in the power of Your Holy Spirit helping me. I adore You. Amen.

I jumped when I woke during the night from one of those quick jab-to-the-face sort of dreams. Since a full night of sleep rarely blankets my night, I immediately prayed to God to help me get it out of my mind. 

A man had held down an eagle on the ground and was about to cut off the eagle’s legs. 

There was nothing more to the dream, but it was enough to disturb me greatly. My heart for animals kept me laying there knowing there was no way I’d get back to sleep without getting the image out of my mind. When I cried out to God, He instantly spoke to my heart:

“If you want to get the image out of your mind, imagine what the eagle would do to get away.”

So I imagined the eagle pecking unrelentingly at the man to get away. Again, it was as though the Holy Spirit spoke to my heart:

“Yes, that’s exactly what the eagle would do. Instinctively the eagle would peck like mad at anyone trying to do such a thing because the eagle wants to get away to fly.”

After that I must have fallen asleep because I didn’t remember anything else until I sat at the table slurping my coconut milk latte. As I wiped the froth from my upper lip, I recalled the dream and realized the Holy Spirt was trying to tell me something – two things, actually! Firstly, that I intuitively know when someone or something is trying to hurt me or hold me down. And secondly, it’s perfectly reasonable and understandable for me to be assertive and not put up with such a thing because, although I’m not meant to literally fly, I am a creation of God with a purpose that should not be thwarted.  

Do you, like me, look back and recall all the times you’ve kept your mouth closed or put up with a bad situation, and you did it to “keep peace”? I think when we do that our intuition-alarm begins fading to an octave we no longer can hear. Furthermore, those human, heartfelt instincts (to peck unrelentingly) to be assertive and stand up for ourselves start leaving us, thus leaving us to feel unworthy and not good enough for what God actually created us to be. 

Ephesians 4:25-27 says, “Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to your neighbor, for we are all members of one body. ‘In your anger do not sin’: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold.” 

A therapist once taught me that there is a difference between being aggressive and being assertive. Basically, aggression occurs unprovoked and assertion involves wisdom. The man trying to hurt the eagle was aggressive. The eagle trying to get away was assertive. Maybe part of being assertive means using the anger we feel inside to give us the boldness to speak truth, in part speaking truth about ourselves as the need arises. 

I wonder if a part of what Paul meant as he spoke to the Ephesians, “In your anger to not sin,” he was saying not to be aggressive but assertive. As he explained further, “Do not to let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold,” I think maybe he was letting us know that when we feel those intuitions to speak out and take a stand for what is true, we need to do so immediately and righteously. Otherwise, bitterness will set in (coupled with negative personalized beliefs when we take a stand for ourselves). Furthermore, not being assertive in the moment allows the devil to gain a foothold in our lives. 

God has a plan for you and me. Like the eagle in my dream asserting its power to protect itself from harm, God has the same desire for us. He doesn’t expect us to succumb to the aggressions of others. Done with godly wisdom, assertion is not a sin. Assertion involves speaking truth without hesitation. Just like the eagle who pecked its way to freedom before the man could gain a “foothold.” We, too, can do the same and find the freedom to be who God created us to be.

Pray with me: Father, You are good, and You have a good plan for my life. Help me in those moments when I need to speak truth to someone who may have ill intentions. I want to stand up for truth about myself and also for Your Truth in general. Teach me to be bold and courageous. Help me to be assertive in a manner that is pleasing to You. Remind me daily to put on Your armor because I want to take a stand against the devil’s schemes. I want nothing to come between You and me. My desire is full commitment in serving You the way You created me to serve. I adore You. Amen.

Ever feel like you’re not enough, or that you should be doing more to make a contribution to the world God created? Although it’s good to strive, shouldn’t there be a sense of contentment day to day so that our spirits aren’t bogged down by the fact that we aren’t accomplishing all that we’d hoped to. I don’t know about you, but it’s as though there is this part of me that seems so vibrant and eager and ready to do more for God, and yet I continue to find reasons I can’t do “bigger” things. 

For one thing, I didn’t finish the Bible college I attended, so that uncomplicated fact intermingled with the complicated fact that I, uh hum, have been married four times lends me to believe that any ministerial pursuit is now out of the question. Don’t get me wrong, I do not believe that we are saved by works. We are saved by the grace of God. (Thank God!) It is His free gift to those who accept Him as their Lord and Savior. My reason for wanting to “do” for God in no way resides in trying to make it to heaven. It is simply because I love Him so much. 

Also, I like to feel needed. I suppose that may be a reason, too, for my serving-God pursuit. Ha! Who am I kidding. That’s a BIG reason: I want to feel like God needs me. Goodness gracious! I literally know that God doesn’t actually “need” me, but to be used by His Holy Spirit in a meaningful way makes me feel loved by Him. Sounds a bit self-serving, doesn’t it? Geesh! My bottom line, though, is that I do love Jesus so much and want to show Him my love by serving Him. Maybe part of this process is fully accepting the fact that He loves me regardless of my works. 

Walk with me as I search His Word for nuggets of His guidance. I’m no theologian, but I am a disciple – I live to follow and serve Him. He loves me, and He loves you. Let’s walk with Him together and see what He has to share. Let’s uncover more about His goodness and begin to grasp how truly gracious He is to you and me. My prayer is that as we get to know Him more and more each day, we learn more about ourselves and how, exactly, He wants to use us. 

There’s something special about being in nature. I think God designed it that way. Without sounding too “out there” I believe there’s a type of energy emitted from living things that those of us who are sensitive to such things are able to experience. I tend to think it’s why I feel the way I do when I’m around nature. Maybe it’s simply because I so appreciate the imagination of God in His creation that it leaves me breathing deeper and smiling bigger as I take it all in. 

It’s no surprise then that I love flowers. All of them. I don’t have a favorite. So this past weekend I planted some flowers. Since I don’t have a lot of experience with gardening, I decided to sprinkle wildflower seeds in a couple barren areas around our home. I cannot wait to see what happens!

As I watered the newly planted seeds, the sun hit the water that showered from the hose in just the right way that a rainbow appeared in the water vapors. It made me smile to wonder what it was like when Noah and his family saw the very first rainbow. God spoke to Noah in Genesis 8:21-22 and said, “Never again will I curse the ground because of humans, even though every inclination of the human heart is evil from childhood. And never again will I destroy all living creatures, as I have done. As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night will never cease.”

As I continued watering and wondering amid the rainbow, I became curious as to why God used water and light to make the rainbow appear as He established this covenant. Why didn’t He simply place His rainbow in the sky to make a promise to patiently love us despite our sinful, human hearts throughout the ongoing seasons of life. 

The story in Genesis 8 continues at verses 12-15, “And God said, ‘This is the sign of the covenant I am making between me and you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come: I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth. Whenever I bring clouds over the earth and the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will remember my covenant between me and you and all living creatures of every kind…’” 

Is it possible that by using light and water to create His rainbow that it is His way of also reminding us that we need the light of Jesus in our lives and His living water to fully comprehend and treasure His promises? I mean, God could have merely set His rainbow in His sky, but instead He used water vapor in the clouds and the light of the sun to make it appear. He used water and light to make it happen. 

In John 7:37-38, Jesus said, “Let anyone who is thirsty come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as Scripture has said, rivers of living water will flow from within them.” And then just a few verses later in John 8:12, Jesus said, “I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will never walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” These statements are promises for our lives, just like the promise within the rainbow. 

When we choose to follow Jesus, we walk in his light and we receive the promise of His living water, His Holy Spirit, flowing from within us. I don’t think I will ever take His rainbow for granted again. Every time I see it I will be reminded of the treasure of His promises in my life. In a sense, maybe we, His children, as we shine His light and display His living water flowing within us, radiate like the rainbow on the lives of others.   

Pray with me: Father, thank You for Your amazing creation and how You speak to me through it.  You have plans for me. Use me daily. Moment by moment show me how I can be a reflection of who You are. Let me shine the light of Your Holy Spirit within me on the lives of those I meet. Your promises are true. I trust You completely and worship You alone. I adore You. Amen.