Joy cometh in the morning

After last night's unfortunate events, I got less than two hours' sleep. Thankfully I haven't managed to find a loophole that lets LB off the hook for this one, so I'm still angry. I mean, really, with 8 trillion women in the world, he has to date one of my friends? I'm so disappointed in his character. And even if his intentions really were to tell me himself before I hear it from someone else, the execution sucks.

But after several hours of mad, I finally went to the first place I should've gone. I talked to God about it. Asked Him to change my heart, accept this as an answered prayer, and move on.

So when I woke up this morning with the sun rising over the lake just outside my window, I had clarity.

There's a reason pity parties are usually a party of one. That's not a fun place to be. I choose joy.

I choose the joy in knowing God answered that prayer and answered it in a way that firmly shut the door and allowed me to move on. I choose joy in knowing that I have the love of an unchanging, Holy Lord who redeemed me from my sin.

For the past couple of weeks, the song "Great is Thy Faithfulness" has been stuck in my head, but never more than early today, when I was reminded of His mercy.

Most of us are familiar with the passage in Lamentations from which that song comes. But what I'd forgotten were the verses prior to that when Jeremiah outlines all of the bad things that he'd been through. Not because of anything He'd done, but because of the sins of His people. He details for nearly 20 verses all of the struggles, but then says,

I'll never forget the trouble, the utter lostness, the taste of ashes, the poison I've swallowed. I remember it all — oh, how well I remember — the feeling of hitting the bottom.

But there's one other thing I remember, and remembering, I keep a grip on hope: God's loyal love couldn't have run out, his merciful love couldn't have dried up.
They're created new every morning. How great your faithfulness!

I'm sticking with God (I say it over and over). He's all I've got left.
~Lamentations 3:19-24 (Msg)

I'm sticking with God. I'm choosing His joy. I'm trusting He knows what's best for me.