Seasons & Cycles

This post is dedicated to Mr. & Mrs. C., dear friends and family to me. They've been such great blessings and I am very thankful for having them in my life.

A weekday afternoon, I was welcomed into the house of a couple from Church who have been dear to me and have been the people that I go to for seeking wisdom, prayers, guidance, and loving care.


Sitting on the couch in their spacious living room warmed by the natural sunlight, we talked about how I've been doing and how things have been going with me.

And as the conversation goes on, my struggles with the painful "falling down, hurting, getting up, waddling a bit, and then on the ground again"pattern [1] in my life came up, so I poured out how it's so exhausting to go through that cycle again and again and again... to a point where I don't even feel like I'd bother keeping my hope up!
Why expect anything if I feel like I'd just be disappointed anyway!? It hurts less if there's not expectation at all... at least the falling distance is shorter.


Things are set out to bring me disappointment, I'm just waiting for things to fail for yet just another time.
Yes, that is very honestly how I feel.

BUT I WANT TO LIFE WITH HOPE BY FAITH!!!!!!!
It just gets harder and harder each time, to keep hoping and keep having faith... I'm still hanging in there, but I'm so afraid that there'd be a time when I'd just decide that I wouldn't even want to get up again!


My friends so graciously listened to me, and then the Mr. said: "You know, Charis, a few years ago, some words of wisdom came to me, and I believe that those words are from God."
I looked at him, wondering if he were to quote a verse from the Bible.
"Seasons will flow and cycles will break," he said.

"So when you feel like things are going through ups and downs, that's just seasons in our lives, and those are good; but when it's point A, point B, point C, then back to point A, point B, point C... then those are cycles, and those should be broken," he continued.

"And you need to believe that you are not destined for the "cycles", those are not your portion!"
"I know it's hard, to break the cycles, all you can do is to pray, and to see yourself as God sees you and keep on going."
He concluded.


His wife nodded as he was sharing those very timely words of wisdom with me.
"You are blessed, not cursed." one of them said (and I can't remember now which one of them said that...)


As the Mrs. and I chuckled over some other things, the Mr. walked into his room and came back with some papers in his hands.
"1 Samuel 30:6," he opened his Bible, and read: "David was greatly distressed because the men were talking of stoning him; each one was bitter in spirit because of his sons and daughters. But David found strength in the LORD his God."
"To find strength is to be encouraged," he added.

Then he pulled out two pieces of notes and said: "here's a letter from my aunt, who is my great prayer warrior. She wrote this letter to me during my hardest time in life and brought me great encouragement."

"Get into the presence and stop there. Even dig deeper." I got a pen and piece of paper from the Mrs. and started writing so I could remember these words.

"Hold on, Charis, put the pen down and let me just read it to you for now." He said.
So I did.
I took of my glasses and just listened.


"Get into the presence (Charis' note: the presence of God) and stop there. Even dig deeper.
Get on with what has now started in your life and go ahead.
Don't look at the situation, go ahead with what God shows you to do.
Even if you don't understand something He tells you, it'll be right in the end.
God's plan for you is to go deep, stay connected to Him and His word, never be uprooted whatever the circumstances.
As you face your difficult situations, as what do You want me to learn (and NOT "why?")
Then as you listen for His plan, trust God, and as you do, you will grow stronger in Him."


I asked him to read it again after he finished the first time.


And there was just silence. Good silence.
The letter said it all, nothing else needs to be added.


At the end of the note was a verse from the Bible: "And Saul’s son Jonathan went to David at Horesh and helped him find strength in God." (1 Samuel 23:16)



As he was reading, the song "Everlasting God" started playing in my head... "strangth will raise as we wait upon the Lord, we will wait upon the Lord, we will wait upon the Lord"....


It was time for me to get on my way, so we prayed and said our good-byes.
But the words "seasons will flow and cycles will break" just lingered in my head for a long time.



The afternoon visit was so uplifting for me, I felt renewed, comforted, and encouraged.


The Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary says this of the Samuel 30:1-6 passage:
"When we go abroad in the way of our duty, we may comfortably hope that God will take care of our families in our absence, but not otherwise. If, when we come off a journey, we find our abode in peace, and not laid waste, as David here found his, let the Lord be praised for it. David's men murmured against him. Great faith must expect such severe trials. But, observe, that David was brought thus low, only just before he was raised to the throne. When things are at the worst with the church and people of God, then they begin to mend. David encouraged himself in the Lord his God. His men fretted at their loss, the soul of the people was bitter; their own discontent and impatience added to the affliction and misery. But David bore it better, though he had more reason than any of them to lament it. They gave liberty to their passions, but he set his graces to work; and while they dispirited each other, he, by encouraging himself in God, kept his spirit calm. Those who have taken the Lord for their God, may take encouragement from him in the worst times."



Dear Jesus, I'm learning, and leaning... walking with You, and trusting that You'll take me out of my sad cycle. You've been telling me to "be still and wait,"thought it's difficult and rough, though I really just want to take matters into my own hands, I will wait for You, for things to turn out the way You wanted them to in Your time. I want Your will to be done in my life, I will obey and be cooperative; please grant me the grace, the strength and the wisdom to do what You want me to do."



Today was a good day, very very good.






[1] that pattern is simply: things would come inton my life, they would "seemingly" go toward a positive direction, but then they'd go bad, and then I would be disappointed and hurt and I'd go through healing and then things would come into my life again, seemingly start getting better again, and take a bad ugly turn, again. On and on...