When ministry has you weary it’s time to learn how to navigate the peaks, valleys and plains in life. We all need to find power to live above your circumstances, and that’s what the book Yellow Balloons is all about. Most of us want to avoid the valley. It’s a place of shadows, a place where less of the sky is visible. But there is perspective to be gained in the valley that can’t be gained elsewhere. Why does failure or rejection hurt so much?
When Ministry Has You Weary
During a TED Talk, Guy Winch explained that our brains register pain in response to rejection. “When scientists placed people in functional MRI machines and asked them to recall a recent rejection, they discovered something amazing. The same areas of our brain become activated when we experience rejection as when we experience physical pain. That’s why even small rejections hurt more than we think they should, because they elicit literal (albeit, emotional) pain.”
As much as we want to think we know best—and that God should be listening more carefully to us—it’s just not true. God knows all, so He knows best. God doesn’t need more of my perspective; I need more of His. And if God brings us into a difficult circumstance it’s for our own good. Only when I began to embrace the pain I experience in life did I start to see and to know what’s true, and the freedom it brings. I learned I can look at circumstances as opportunities rather than sources of agitation, which brings a lot of peace.
I have learned that knowing God by faith is not important only for the next life. It also has a very real and important aspect of current happiness. When I understand that what is happening now is shaping me forever, it provides tremendous comfort and even encouragement. Most of life is not lived in the valley nor on the mountaintop. Most of our existence is not a low or high, an up or a down. Most of our time on Earth is lived on the plains, the midpoint between the ups and downs. In a word, most of life is routine. We should be thankful for this since everyday routines are amazing opportunities. Routine life gives us opportunities that change eternity.
