A Life on Display
Hi, I’m Joni Eareckson Tada and sometimes when I hurt, I put on a smile. I make myself smile, even when (no, especially when) I don’t feel like it. “Oh God,” I’ll pray, “I don’t want to, but please, please help me; give me your smile cuz I don’t feel like smiling.” Now, is this being hypocritical? I don’t think it is. Now, if my intention were to deceive others, yes it would be. But my intention in forcing a smile is to convince myself, not others. I am informing my soul; I am telling myself to stop looking inward, Joni, and start looking outward. Besides, as an ambassador of Christ, I have a responsibility to do that. Others are watching and they are learning about God through my actions and attitudes. So, your response to suffering matters; not just for yourself, but to a watching world. So, today, press on and be faithful. Borrow God’s smile, if you must, because your life is on display!
© Joni and Friends
The Scars That Have Shaped Me:
How God Meets Us in Suffering
Twenty-one surgeries by age thirteen. Years in the hospital. Verbal and physical bullying from schoolmates. Multiple miscarriages as a young wife. The death of a child. A debilitating progressive disease. Riveting pain. Abandonment. Unwanted divorce.
Vaneetha Rendall Risner begged God for grace that would deliver her. But God offered something better: his sustaining grace.
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