Looking on things of others....

Phil. 2:14- Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others.

 Ever have one of those days where you are just overwhelmed at some issue you are dealing with?  It always seems to be the same time that someone else calls you and tells you some issue they are dealing with.  That is when we react as any human would, and in our minds think ' you really don't what hard is, you should walk in my shoes for a day!'.  Before we know it we have enclosed ourselves in our little bubble and get the 'woe is me ',  'no one understand', or the ' I am better/stronger than you because of what I am dealing with' complex. But in truth our problems are only a matter of perspective.

Our life circumstance only seems so big because we are the ones right next to them. I have caught myself sometimes getting angry and frustrated at people for not feeling as bad for me as I felt for myself. But we all have our own burdens to bear.

That is when the verse in Philippians really struck home to me. God brought it to my remembrance that I needed to stop looking at myself and start doing as I need to and look to other people with the same compassion I expected.  To truly be the woman, wife, and mother I need to be...I knew I needed to stop looking at my problems and start helping others bear theirs.

Yes, my husband is deployed. Yes, I am raising our baby girl right now virtually alone. Yes, I am half a world away from my home, and there are a million stresses going on that I can't even start to number.  But do I not have a healthy baby girl? Do I not have a husband who loves me and is doing everything he can to take care of me? Am I not able to spend quality time with family that I didn't think I would get to see for a very long time? Yes, I do. My blessings are uncountable.

My heart breaks for the families who will never know the joy of seeing their soldiers again. For the family who have lost a 3 year old little girl in a tragic accident. For the families torn apart by sin, and slowly starting to repair. For the girl who's heart has been broken countless times and still manages to make it on her feet again. The one who is still waiting....
Those who's womb's are still empty, and those who are saying goodbye to a husband for the first time. Those who are jobless and not knowing of any money coming in...

Once my eyes were taken off the situation I am in and looked upon what was going on around me, my problems didn't seem like so much of a giant anymore.

 God gives us what He knows we can handle, and adds a little more so we can learn to lean on Him. But in our problems God knew we would by nature lose perspective on reality of a situation, and that is why He told us to " Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things of others."