March 4, 2017 - What to Do When Having a Really Bad Day

March 4, 2017

What to Do When Having a Really Bad Day

I woke up this morning 10 minutes before my alarm went off.  I left behind a bad dream.  I was with three family members at the home I grew up in Duncanville, sitting out front along the road watching something, but I don’t remember what.  Suddenly there was a plane flying really low that stopped and pointed something at a house nearby.  Out spewed a liquid that caught the house on fire.  I tried to get my family to come inside, but they were watching the fire.  Terrified I woke up.  I wasn’t in the best of moods when I got out of bed.

I couldn’t seem to get ready in time this morning and I was expecting to not be ready when my taxi arrived, but I was downstairs before he was.  That was because he never arrived.  I called the taxi company and they said he would arrive soon, they were sure.  I waited 10 minutes and he didn’t arrive.

So I walked to the plaza around the corner to look for a taxi.  I found one quickly.  When I said where I needed to go and asked the price, he said 10 Bs. more than I usually pay.  I said if he couldn’t do it for my usual price, I’d have to leave.  He agreed.  About halfway to school he said he needed to get gas.  I explained that there was a gas station by my school.  He said the gas would only take 5 or 10 minutes.  But I was already late and said if he couldn’t take me to school, I’d have to find another taxi.  Grumbling he took me to school.

I had some papers I needed to copy for two classes.  Of course, you figured it, the copy machine didn’t act right. Still I was in class before my students.  This day of the week the faculty gather to pray.  I missed that and I needed that.

In my first class I had half of my students who were not finished with their work.  That meant I had to modify what I wanted to do on the spot.  During my second class, I was helping a boy find an answer to a grammar problem.  Another boy, standing next to me, waiting to ask a question, whispered, “D.”  When I corrected him, he was disrespectful.  Another boy lost his workbook, but swears he gave it to me.  In my third class, I had a boy who pushes the limits a bit, disappear in the bathroom for 10 minutes.  So school today was not the easiest.  I left with a ton of papers to grade.

My required day at the school is short.  Most days I am heading home by 11:00 am.  So I can’t complain about a long dreary day.  But today I already had a headache.

The day before I spent all afternoon working on lesson plans, when my printer ink ran out.  I can’t just run to Wal-Mart and replace it.  I have to go to a special place in town to get what I need.  That meant another hour just to get an ink cartridge across town, and two taxi rides.

The purpose of this blog is not to complain about my day.  The purpose is to introduce you to Bolivia, its people, the church, the school, and things like that.  Coming up the elevator to my apartment (God has given me the most beautiful place you can imagine to live in), I was asking how I can turn this around.  I got online and looked for some answers. 

There are days we feel overwhelmed, insufficient.  Sometimes we just wish it were all over.  Paul said, in 2 Corinthians 1:8-9, “For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself.  Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death.  But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead.”

We must get back to the essentials.  What is it that God has done for us?  He has provided a home for us after we die.  We all know that, and most of us believe that.  But what has He really done? In Romans 5 it says, “When we were yet without strength, in due time God died for the ungodly.”  That is not just for some time in the distant future, but for now.  He wants us now.

I was without strength today.  It would be so easy to call it quits.  But Christ died for me, the most ungodly sinner of all time, so that He could work through me.  I have been wondering if I really was called to return to Bolivia.  I was thinking of how many mistakes I have made, and of the sins I commit far too often to call myself a “good” Christian.

In Ephesians 3, there is the promise that God is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all we could ask or imagine.  I go back to that verse and realize God has a purpose.  As my friend, Tim, said a few weeks ago, if we are at a particular place, even if we haven’t heard a voice from Heaven, God has a purpose for us to be where we are.  Where we are now, is where God wants us to rely on Him.  That is our purpose, to learn to rely on Him.  Once we surrender that to Him, we will see wonders in our lives.

Pray for me that I will learn to rely on God rather than my own strength.

And just as I write this, I spill my dinner down the front of me.

Thanks to Pastor Paul Edwards article “Hearing God at the End of a Bad Day,” on crosswalk.com for some good advice.  I needed it.

This was originally written back in October.  To me, it was one of my best blogs.