Always pray to have eyes that see the best in people, a heart that forgives the worst, a mind that forgets the bad, and a soul that never loses faith in God

When I read this quote, I instantly think of Jesus Christ.

Can you see it too?

All of these attributes are totally aspirations for humans like us, but for the Son of God – this THIS is what he came to earth to show us! And we have the ability to try!

Remember when those initial bracelets were super popular W.W.J.D – “what would Jesus do”

How many people do you know that wore those bracelets and were still assholes to their neighbor, unforgiving of the friend, ignored the donation request for XYZ, etc. Prayed in public and then acted like the world when they didn’t think anyone was looking.

I bet you can immediately put a list together. Me too. But here’s the thing friends – we are all that person! Whether we want to acknowledge it or not…at some level, to varying degrees, we are all wearing the bracelets and still impressively falling short! sorry, not sorry.

When you go through a trauma – loss of a loved one or betrayal – its so easy (and understandable) to allow the pain & hurt from that experience to build up and solidify into anger, resentment, and bitterness. But after the dust settles and the shock wears off – you have to decide who you want to be. Do you want to have eyes, heart, mind, and soul that is angry? Or do you want to be a child of God who is living a life already forgiven – and therefore, wholeheartedly try to forgive others, especially the ones that hurt us the most? this just makes it even more important to set your eyes on Christ and pray for God to soften your heart.

The part about being a follower of Christ that always gets me in the jugular is that I don’t deserve the grace and forgiveness that he’s given me, but he gave it to me anyway. I am flawed and full of sin and even on my best days, I still fail at being the person that deserves all of God’s grace and eternity spent in His presence!

When I think about the various dialogues that run through my brain, Lord, THANK YOU for already forgiving me!

I know that I will fail on a daily basis, but I still want to be Christ-like and pray every day to be a bit better than the person I was yesterday. But its hard –

After the dust settled with my divorce, I started to pray (a ton!) about how to forgive my ex-husband. I knew I needed to forgive him. Not for him, not-at-all (pfft! No sis!) For me! I mean – my mom had been dead for 6 weeks when he left me for some other woman (and then, unsurprising plot twist – came back to me & wanted to “save our marriage” #eyeroll) I was SO angry with him. But I knew that I was never going to be the kind of person that had joy and lived a life of X if I kept this anger and resentment.

At the end of the day – my message here is to PRAY! We have to pray to be able to do and be all the things that we should be. Because, even on our BEST day, there is no way we can live a life this pure and beautiful. Add pain into the mix, and you might as well just hang up the towel. We cannot do this alone friends. We need God to help us be the best version of ourselves.

And my prayer for you today is that God gives you the eyes, heart, soul & mind to be the best version of yourself – one that strives to live a life like Christ and comes as close as you’re humanly possible.

XO

Tay