Considering it pure joy??

I have been pondering over a conversation I had with someone earlier this week.  How can we continue our walk toward holiness and continue to grow when we don't feel good, really sick or really tired or really depressed or really_________ (fill in your own trial)  When I had three kids 4 and under I was tired.  Fatigued.  Worn out.  Not to mention emotional. Which could have been because I was tired.  So I would cry, scream, eat, cry, scream eat.  Just a vicious cycle.  Looking back I can see I was drowning in fear and shortsightedness.  You know when you keep telling yourself this is how it is going to be forever...blah blah blah.  Though my kids were small and hopefully won't remember their mom a wreck I grieve over bad decisions and moments lost by not sustaining myself on His word.  I think I could have enjoyed them more.  I would not have made such poor judgements.    In the last couple of years I have read biographies of women who endured much more than the baby blues, a small house in a bad neighborhood and squabbles with the hubby.  They didn't just endure.  They did what James 1 says they considered "it pure joy, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance.  Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete not lacking anything."  Trials here are sickness and persecutions.  The women I have read about changed their world and mine.  One of my favorites has been Elisabeth Elliot.  Alot of us know her as the wife of Jim Elliot, the one who was killed in a jungle by the ones he was trying to carry the gospel to.  Your husband killed now that is a real trial.  She lived in a jungle for a year as a single woman before marrying him.  Not knowing anyone she, followed God to South America.  She lived in a house where the walls did not meet the ceiling.  Where bugs, huge bugs and bats came into her room every night.  Now that is a trial.  Persevering through all for her Lord.  Amy Carmichael is one I am just now getting acquainted with.  So far I do know she lived in the slums of England to reach out to the lowly poverty stricken women of her day.  She didn't have to.  Her family had a decent place to live.  But she wanted to display that you could have joy in the midst of such darkness with Christ.  She endured terrible sickness from her conditions, bugs, rats all for the Lover of her soul.  Joy in the midst of trials.  These two women did not turn to the right or left when things got difficult.  They persevered in joy.  I could go on and on.  Gladys Aylward, a family favorite.  Again endured much heartache and sickness all for the name of her God.  She carried His love to the children of China.    Reading all these books has helped me to carry on in the midst of my own trials.  Truly, mine pale in comparison to theirs.  Who am I to complain?  Who am I to say I can't carry on another day?  There was nothing great about these women other than the God they served and followed.  The very same one I serve and follow.  The power they had is the same power offered to me everyday, that I choose to pick up and use or ignore.    Over the recent years I have chosen to imagine them as my cloud of witnesses, chanting on the sidelines of my life.  Encouraging me on in my race.  I want to run with all I have for Him.  The GREAT ONE who pulled me from my pit.  I share all this for a reason.  I have struggled with many things in my life and continue to.  I know you do to.  Some times He picks us up and carries us through, and you look back and know you couldn't have made it with out Him.  Other times we must make the effort to hold on and move forward, dig in.  I know this life in the times we live is hard.  Hard to stay faithful to your husband when so much is being offered otherwise.  Hard to serve others when the world says you deserve  more me time.  Hard to be pure, hard to love more, hard to quiet your soul before Him.  But we MUST and we CAN, cause He says so!  The Bible says "He gives strength to the weary"  That a godly woman's "arms are strong for her tasks"  If you sense urgency in this, there is.  The devil prowls around looking for another one to take down.  Hold fast!  When we lay our heads down for the final time, just before our eyes close to open on our eternity, we don't want to look back and see the rubble laying in heaps of the decisions we  have made and the loved ones left in the midst.  Don't quit!  Don't quit! 
Walking this road with you and Him,
Carrie