Earlier this week I was running behind with my day, and I didn’t get to read my devotional before starting my day. I had been struggling with my thoughts about how I was supposed to have this whole new me, when I am still living in the family home that was once shared with my ex-husband. I was wallowing in my own self-pity, and imagining that my friends and acquaintances still saw me as the ex-wife of said ex-husband. See y’all; it’s okay to have days that you just don’t feel okay. We all have them. I went on with my day, slapped my smile on, and thought “Girl, you are going to go conquer your day!”
Even though I didn’t get to start my day with my devotion, I conquered the day like a beast. That’s just what strong-willed, strong-minded women do. However, after cooking dinner, I sat down with my girls and wanted to read my devotion aloud to them. They politely declined. I opened up my devotion book, and the title of the day’s devotion was “Making Old Things New.” WOW! God was surely speaking to me. Here I had been worrying about this whole “new” me thing, and then bam! God hit me with the devotion. The devotion spoke about a woman that had been painting an old dresser. She couldn’t decide how many coats of paint to put on it, so she text a friend for advice. The friend giggled and told her, “Paint it till you like it.”
This spoke to me on a deep level. You see, my friends, family, and acquaintances only saw the happy Jessica. They never saw the pain behind the smile, because I hid that so well for many years. As the months have passed that I have been able to create the new Jessica, I am reminded that I have a strong foundation in which I have built this new me. I kept asking myself why I allowed myself to change who I was just to please my ex-husband. I allowed him to take away my character in order to try to be a submissive and God honoring wife. What I thought was biblically correct, I was actually wrong. God would never ask a person to change and steer away from Him. That is what I had found that I did the last few years of my marriage in order to try and be something that I thought my ex-husband wanted. I could see our marriage failing, and I tried correcting it by changing who I was. In taking in the devotion, I realized that I didn’t change who I was, but I changed the things I did in order to try and please my ex-husband.
Y’all, never change who you are in order to please someone. Yes, marriage is a compromise, but don’t compromise your beliefs or values for anyone. In Isaiah 65:17, it states that the Lord will create a new heaven and a new earth. Create is referring to activity that only God can perform. Joy, not sorrow, will characterize the lives of the Lord’s people. How perfect and fitting of a verse to go with the devotional. With change, you still carry the old you, but a new and more beautiful you will emerge. By the end of reading my devotion, I realized that my past has helped to create this new and more perfect me. A new me that gets to spend quality time with her children again. This new me allows me to go on spontaneous adventures. I have never been a spontaneous girl, and y’all let me tell you, I love every second of it. I have made so many wonderful memories with these spontaneous acts. When you see the pictures of me smiling, I am no longer hiding any pain. You are seeing the real me. The “new” me that is filled with so much joy in life.
In sharing my story, I hope that you take a few key things away. Ladies, always be who you want to be. Don’t change or do things that take away from what your morals are. Be spontaneous! I promise you it will bring you an amazing amount of joy and happy memories. Feed your soul with God’s word, even if it is just a short devotion in the mornings, or one before bed. I currently have two going. One is a devotion that is short for the morning and one that’s a video study before bed. Lastly, do things for you! This is key to happiness. Workout, go out with your girlfriends, go on a random drive through the country with your windows down, and chase your dreams! Do all the things, ladies! Go live your best life and be the best you that you can be.
Front Porch Diary 