Attitude is a Choice!

I'm in the middle of reading a book entitled " Lord, Change My Attitude (Before It's Too Late)" by James Macdonald. I am loving the way he writes and the straight-forward yet down-to-earth way that he relates the information about our attitudes and how they affect our lives.

I have learned this... Attitude is a choice. It is not based on what is going on around us, although, those things can affect our choice. Ultimately, though, when it gets right down to it, my attitude is my choice and no one else's. The first attitude that he addresses is a complaining attitude. The author tells us about the attitude of complaining and expressed how we can completely ruin our life and forfeit God's blessing by having a complaining attitude. He uses the Israelites as an example. Long story, short, they Israelites could have been blessed with entrance into the Promised Land, they could have been blessed with a long journey made easier by God's hand, they could have been blessed with good health and all they food and water they could take in... instead, they chose to grumble and complain the entire journey, they chose to have an attitude of "woe is me" rather than "thank God for rescuing us from Egypt", they chose to bad mouth their Leader and not benefit from the blessings God offered. THEY CHOSE! And by so doing, they chose to wander in the wilderness for 40+years.

How does it apply to my life? Well, that's pretty easy. When faced with struggles that I have no control of, I can choose to praise God in the midst of it, or I can choose to grumble and complain and be forfeiting the blessing of His promise. Instead I would have the distinct "privilege", though it wouldn't be a privilege at all, of creating my own wilderness. A place where I could spend the rest of my life in unbearable heat, wandering around looking for hope, thirsting at every corner, wondering why God wasn't showing up to help me out. The truth is, He's always there, it's just that if I create this wilderness of a life in which I spend all of my time grumbling and complaining, I can't hear Him or see Him working because I'm focusing too much on my own "pain".

It's very interesting that every devotional I read, every book I pick up, every passage of scripture God points me towards, I can see how it relates to our infertility. I am so thankful for that. It is a way to remind me that there are so many others out there dealing with the same thing. It causes me to consciously make an effort to continue to cry out to God. It encourages me to know that He is faithful, he keeps His promises, and if I bless Him with my thoughts and my words and my actions, I will reap a reward beyond anything I can imagine. Our infertility is not a mistake. It was planned from the very beginning. I choose to believe that it is being used in our lives to draw us ever closer to His heart. It is a tool for forcing us to put our trust completely in Him. It it the solution to get us depending on Him fully for our happiness. We accept the challenge, Father!

I feel like I am daily faced with an opportunity to put into action what I have been reading. I am thankful for that. Only after repetition do things become habit. This past weekend I attended my sister's 2nd baby shower. I thought it might be a hard day, because the last baby shower was. There's just something about sitting and watching someone else go through all of that... it makes the desire to have it for myself so much stronger. Not only the guest of honor, but 4 others were pregnant at the shower... count them... FIVE! Nothing like having it right in your face all the time! Goodness! God was gracious, though, He granted me patience and by his grace only, was I able to choose an attitude of Hope and to breathe through the pain that threatened to spill. I won't lie.. I shed a few tears on the way home, but they were cleansing. They were tears that spoke of the hope that I have. Tears, even, of happiness at what will be someday. God is good! He knows just what I need and just when I need it. In the meantime, while I wait for God to answer our prayers of a family, I choose an attitude of Praise!