Between Cupcakes

I LOVE cupcakes!!  Especially if they are devils food chocolate with fluffy white frosting!  Oh my!!  They are the best!!  So why do I share this tidbit of information?  Because this week was one of those times where I NEEDED cupcakes; a lot of them!  There is nothing better than those delicate, fluffy cupcakes topped with fluffy not so sweet frosting!  I had such a hard day, that I ate six of them right in a row and smacked my lips with everyone!  As I was eating them, I thought maybe there was something to the name of them.  The devil was sure doing a number on me today and I was eating my way through it with cupcakes!  And…I was careful not to leave any crumbs behind!

Now, it is a couple of days since that time and I got to thinking, “Why is it that we do that to ourselves?”  Do we think that something like that is going to helps us feel better?  Or, that eating them will somehow dissolve the problems that we are facing?  I have to admit, though, they really hit the spot!!  But my problem was still right in front of me.  Sometimes, we do this kind of thing and then deal with the guilt afterwards.  I can’t say I felt the guilt where chocolate cupcakes with fluffy white frosting are concerned, but along the lines of, “Shoot!  I did it again!”

I guess what I have thought about in retrospect is, that in all fairness to great cupcakes, they don’t help much of anything, except taste good at the moment!  When I look back on eating my six cupcakes in a row on Monday, I didn’t care about the reasoning.   But now what I am wondering is, why didn’t I go to the Source of all problem solving and ask for His intervention?  What is it about pride that keeps us from going directly to Him for the calm and peace we need?  Or maybe the insight we need to identify what is really going on, and the boldness to share it?  Maybe, because we would have to be responsible for our reactions, as well as, our actions.  I kind of think so.  It would mean I would have to go to prayer and ask for help instead of allowing my feelings to control me, so I can feel justified.  So…(pause) what?  I am just going to eat those cupcakes because…I CAN?  I deserve them?  I can even tell myself that if I have a bad day, and don’t do it again tomorrow, then I can justify eating them.  Amazing what our brain and heart can figure out between them, when we don’t listen to the Holy Spirit.  We can get SO creative!!

We are always going to have those “things” that tempt us, make us angry, hurt our feelings, or cause us to go for the one thing we love.  Satan loves to put those temptations right in front of our eye gates.  He will even go through the trouble to set up the scenario for you!  He loves to use his expertise to make that happen!  What we are doing may taste good to our emotions at the time, but there are always consequences to not taking it to the Lord first.  Always.

I share this because I know we all deal with this in some way, shape or form.  I want to be able to go the God with anything first, and ask Him to help me figure it out.  I want to deal with it in His way and His timing.  I want to surrender my pride and listen to the still small voice, and take my next steps accordingly.  I can send myself on all kinds of guilt trips, OR, I can go to God and ask for His direction.  His strength will give me the power to say no to what I FEEL like doing.  If I ask Him, He will let me know what I need to do.  We have a free will and can decide to pray about it, or, eat six cupcakes and have nothing change.

I want to change and be more like He wants me to be.  In the time it took me to eat those cupcakes, I might have been able to totally solve the problem if I had been willing to face the problem, pray about it, and do what I know God would have wanted me to do.  Humm…do I detect a bit of rebellion in there somewhere?  Possibly.   That isn’t the way I want to live my life, and it will not help me live in peace and harmony.

Now, does mean that you can’t eat cupcakes?  Of course not.  But maybe not six of them, and certainly not for reasons and emotions that you alone are responsible for.   I had my time with the Lord to talk this over with Him.  But I kind of get the feeling that I should have done that in the first place.  Duh!  He gently reminds me that He is here with me.  I can always come to Him with anything.   Now that I listened to the Holy Spirit, I have taken action regarding my reaction.  I learned.  I live another day to learn some more.  In learning something valuable, I got to drop another heart in my Gratitude Jar.

Walking the journey with you…