You know, God doesn’t give with strings–He blesses the just and the unjust. He gifts are out of love for us, not out of any guilt since He doesn’t have any.

I know it hurts to see waste when you have such need, but remember that your sister is operating from her own framework. She’s seeing things through her lens and not yours. And you’re seeing things through yours and not hers.

I’m trying to get in the habit of trying to look at situations from others’ perspectives. Sometimes it helps; sometimes it doesn’t. It’s just one way that I keep hostility from building up. “Cos once hostility builds up, now I’ve got a problem.

Let’s pray for each other.

I will comment on something else you said. You know, I think we learn to try to do everything ourselves because we think that others should see our need (unless they’re blind) and help without us having to ask. And when the giving comes, there are the questions that come with it.

I’ve been blessed to be on the giving end more than the receiving end, at least when it comes to money, but there are times when I’ve needed a shoulder to cry on. But it seems people, family included, think my shoulders can handle anything.

Slowly but surely, I’m showing them that they need to “be there” for me, too. I found that I was building up hostility towards them when I felt like they weren’t there for me.

Sometimes we do act as if God blesses by dropping support out of the sky when, in actuality, he uses others to do His blessing. We just have to remember that “we” are the “others” He uses.

So I’m learning to let my needs be known, and most of the time when I have, those around me have not let me down. When they do, I’m learning to just look around because it means that God has provided another way, or “a ram in the bush.” I just have to keep looking for it.

Thanks, again, for sharing, Sigrun. This has been good for me.

I do NOT mean ignoriing other peoples spiritual needs but the Lord has shown me a tendency in myself to notice ‘imperfections’ in my husband and others but not in me.

I need your prayers.

One sister who makes a six-figure income, flew me from Kentucky to Atkanta, where we stayed at the Westin Hotel for 8 days – then flew to Miami and boarded a cruise ship for 4 days. Then we came back to Miami, spent the night and flew back to Kentucky. During this time we ate at a hotel or some classy/expensive restaurant for every meal. My husband and I could have eaten WELL for six months – normally for nine months or more – but the purpose was to sooth her conscience by doing something, not to help me with my needs. That was 4 1/2 years ago and since I stayed with my husband – nada since then.

I will always love my dysfunctional family but to me there is something wrong with your Christianity if you; have retired from the army after 20 years, gotten a job making $175,000 a year, live in a $300,000 home, have a PAID-FOR 2003 Jaguaur and Ford Explorer, but cannot help your sister because she did not do what you wanted!!!

There’s another book Angela:). And Sigrun, you got me at a bad moment. I try to reconcile my life by doing what God tells me so that I don’t dwell on what I see as wrong.

I’m sorry if there’s something inscrutable in it. I really was just expressing my thoughts and reactions as I thought of what you two have realized from that week. I have no idea what Rick Warren wrote and am not even sure exactly where my book is at the moment.

But it’s been very pleasant having a chat with you even though it was essentially one-sided. Thanks, for letting yourselves be used by God in expressing your feelings. I hope mine were true expressions as well.

Luckily there seem to be two different systems so that we got the heat going in the apartments.

Anyway, I’ll just respond to what you’ve been saying, Angela and Charlotte, without any preconceptions on how things should/could be.

First of all, I pray that your house will sell. From my sister too I know it’s no fun paying the mortgage on two properties. Never having had a house of my own I can only imagine what it’s like. I’ve had enough trouble with finances as it is.

Some of my family members especially would say that is one of my main goals. Maybe it’s a form of envy. All three siblings are doing well financially while, as noted, I don’t even have a house to call my own. That’s never really been important for me except that I’m getting tired of being caught up in the vagaries of others as to where I can live. Certainly I still have some dreams as to where I’d like to travel but they’re not burning goals.

I would also say that there are too many people around me that tell me what my life should be like–some because I’m a Christian, others that I should learn to have more “fun”. Being single like you, Angela, I was told by one family member that I should concentrate even harder on working to win souls. Isn’t it marvellous how easily we can always solve other people’s problems but rarely our own?

I know that I don’t know what heaven *really* means to us Christians: to be able to lay our crowns proudly before Christ feels kind of strange to me. I’ve always been very deprecating about my achievements–maybe because in the back of my mind it is not really *my* achievement but Christ who helped me. I’ve been accused of false humility. I guess I really must become aware of what heaven truly means to us as Christians: being governors of others and other tasks like that. The things seem very strange to me. And yet I’m always under a lot of stress. Everything seems to be a source of stress no matter what it is.

About depending on myself: I admit that I prefer doing everything myself. On the other hand, as a single, I’m being forced to do a lot by myself where I would prefer to have some help. I’m thinking here of things like simple carpentry that has to be done and I can’t do it and don’t know whom to ask. Moving my furniture and large boxes was all a part of that. I finally broke down and asked the church if they could find someone to help me. Again it seems like a double-edged sword. On the other hand, I do rely on God for many of these things and the question is where to draw the line. It becomes especially important when certain family members have told me not to ask them for *any* help. God still needs agents to help me do these very earthly tasks. Do I just pray for God to send someone or do I go and approach people myself? Again, a very fine line for me and others as well, I suppose.

So, Charlotte, here you can see what some people think of me and my supposed driving forces: laziness (when I have pain so that I can hardly move); being negative (when I tell people I hurt or can’t afford something they think I should have; etc., etc. But can they see inside me? Can we see inside anybody to see the true person as God sees us or them?

My sister-in-law’s mother passed away Jan. 30. Unless my sister-in-law was able to convince her mother of her need for Christ during the Wednesday chats with her mother during the time off work that she got, we don’t really know if she accepted Christ as her savior. This is the first funeral that I was at where someone I loved did not seem to be a Christian. But I can’t know that. It made it hard for me to reassure my nephew that he would see his grandmother again.

I concur with your goal, Charlotte, and feel the same way: that we often let other things get in our way. But he has not finished his work in us yet and won’t on earth so that nobody can boast. We are all works in progress. Sometimes we have to remember that about other people, other Christians as well. *None* of us have been perfected. Even the greatest preachers and theologians are still prone to sinning.

But my PERSONAL GOAL is to be the best Christian I can be!!! I don’t always feel that I am reaching my goal and sometimes I see other things getting in the way but that IS my focus/driving force.