2 BleSSed 2 B StRessED

So um....how many times have you heard that phrase?

You can find it anywhere from a bumper sticker to a T-shirt. Know what else you can find? The stress you're too blessed to have. What does this phrase even mean? I have some questions.

When Joseph was thrown into a pit by his brothers and left for dead? Was he stressed?

When that same Joseph ran out of the Potiphar's house while his boss' wife screamed rape, was Joseph stressed?

What about Moses after traipsing around the wilderness with a bunch of ingrates who wanted to do some things to him? Was Moses stressed?

What about Jesus as they pounded metal spikes into his wrists and feet and spat on him and struck him repeatedly? Was our Lord and Savior just a wee bit stressed?

I believe I am a blessed man but I question if I am impenetrable against stress. I was on the way to work one morning. I was having challenges with my allergy since the pollen count was so high but nothing too extreme. One of my eyes began to itch slightly but nothing too out of the ordinary. I went into work same as I always do as one of my peers screamed out "What's wrong with your eye?"

Then another peer came over and said the exact same thing but with much more animation. I raced into the bathroom and half of my left eye was totally blood red. I busted a blood vessel somehow. I didn't feel anything or sense that I was tight about any particular situation. The medical term is a "subconjunctival hemorrhage". It looks scary but it should disappear within two weeks or so. That's not the part I want to draw your attention to.

Stress. Out of all the things that could've cause my eye situation, this is the one thing everyone that saw me diagnosed as the cause.

Stress. How does it look? How does it feel? What does it taste like?

Most people don't think it's possible to be stressed and not know it. I think it's a common thought to have some stress-related symptoms but not associate them with stress. You could be sad or angry about a situation and not associate it with stress. You just may focus on the person that is getting on your nerves. But while you stand slighted, part of you is being diminished. When stress is on the scene, you lose something. Stress causes disease and disease always takes no prisoners. It destroys everything in its path. Disease is ruthless, merciless, and heartless. It does the only thing it knows how to do: Obliterate.

My blogs are always full of personal anecdotes, pearls of wisdom that I am blessed to receive so I share them, and often some painful realizations that I come to privately but I share them publicly for the betterment of someone else. This time is no different.

I truly thought that all of the challenges I was dealing were given to the Lord. (See I Peter 5:7) I was wrong. I put all my stuff in the Lord's storehouse but since I had a key, the temptation to open the door and retrieve some of that same stuff was greater than I originally thought. I picked it back up again. I don't know where and when it happened but I must have. How else would I be stressed? I didn't fully trust God. That's the real truth. I tried to use my intellect and insights to "figure it out" and it cost me something. Something I may not be able to get back.

What could happen if we truly trusted in the Creator of every thing and less on what we think and what we believe and what we want? What would happen if we permanently cast all of our cares off of our shoulders? What if we legitimately trusted in God for everything? How different would our lives be? Would we be able to truly detect how blessed we are? Could we more than adequately explain why we are blessed and it goes beyond a t-shirt, a catchphrase, or a church membership?

If you are blessed, what does that entail? How does that state dictate how you treat yourself? Or how you treat others? How does it affect the way you pray? Or what you ask for when you do pray? If you are blessed, does it make you nicer? Does it make you stronger? Does it make you fearful of returning to a "non-blessed" state? Will it cause you to take more faith steps than normal? Lots of folks know what it means to be stressed but (it seems) not as many understand what it means to be blessed.

Like I said. I have some questions.

"Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers, but whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and who meditates on his law day and night. That person is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither - whatever they do prospers." (Psalms 1:1-3 NIV)