Posts
Hannah Morrell
Battling Discouragement

Several years ago, I received an email from a brother in Christ reprimanding me for saying that followers of Jesus could be discouraged or anxious. He tried to tell me that I was wrong for suggesting it, and that couldn’t be part of the believers’ experiences. I wanted to respond in anger, maybe trying to fight back for all the amazing people I have worked with who struggle with these things and not because they are messing up. Instead, God directed me to sit in the Psalms for a while, seeing the pattern so often with David of despair and hopelessness turning to new hope and encouragement.

Psalm 42 is a great illustration of this pattern, and I recently went through it again to look for David’s process in dealing with his own discouragement. I think so often we see discouragement as the end, rather than another place to hear from God and walk back through His faithfulness to a place of encouragement. Here are the steps that I see David taking in moving from darkness to light.

Battling Discouragement
Posts
Hannah Morrell
A Jungle from Barren Ground

Pain in the summer is never fun. Not that pain is ever enjoyable, but the summer just seems to compound the frustration. Everyone is supposed to be enjoying life and the weather, and you feel like crawling in a hole and never coming out.

During the summer of 2016, I sat on the back porch with a couple of friends after my kids had gone to bed and my pain spilled over to them. I looked at my life and wondered what on earth I was going to do moving forward. Generally I like to keep a tight lid on my stuff—opening up seems vulnerable and raw. But this night was one where the honeysuckle smelled sweetest, the warm air wrapped me up in its hug and the crickets sang from their little homes under the grass. It all came pouring out, and was received in such a gracious, loving way.

After I was done talking, my friends prayed for me, asking for direction and hope in the days ahead. And the most powerful piece of that was when one of the girls popped her head up and remembered the story I had told her earlier in the evening about my back yard.

A Jungle from Barren Ground
Posts
Hannah Morrell
Enjoying the Abundance

Today as I was asking God about how He provides, He brought me to John’s gospel in chapter 6 when Jesus feeds the 5,000. I thought about the young boy who was willing to give them his five loaves and two fish, and what must have gone through his mind in offering his food for the day to the disciples for the crowd. I don’t think we have a good perspective on what a sacrifice this was for this boy. He couldn’t run to the grocery store and buy more food, and he probably gave his food expecting he would go hungry that day. This boy didn’t know what Jesus was about to do, but he knew this teacher needed the food and gave it without any expectation of reward.

The other thing I realized is that this boy got to eat the multiplied food too! He didn’t go stand off to the side while everyone else ate—it was for him as well. And verse 12 says that everyone was “satisfied” so no one left hungry. What a beautiful way to show that whatever we offer and surrender to Jesus, He receives with joy and multiplies it for us as well as for those around us. It may not seem like much, or it may seem like everything. But either way, we get to partake in the generosity of our Heavenly Father.

Andrew Murray in Absolute Surrender says “It is the very nature and being of God to delight in communicating Himself. God has no selfishness, God keeps nothing to Himself. God’s nature is to be always giving. In the sun and the moon and the stars, in every flower you see it, in every bird in the air, in every fish in the sea. God communicates life to His creatures. And the angels around His throne, the seraphim and cherubim who are flames of fire—whence have they their glory? It is because God is love, and He imparts to them of His brightness and His blessedness. And we, His redeemed children—God delights to pour His love into us. And why? Because, as I said, God keeps nothing for Himself. From eternity God had His only begotten Son, and the Father gave Him all things, and nothing that God had was kept back. ‘God is love.’”

Enjoying the Abundance
Hannah Morrell
Giving Thanks Before We Receive

God is teaching me these days about giving thanks in the “before.” As in, before the answer comes, the change happens and the provision is delivered. We love giving thanks “after” and there’s nothing wrong with that. But when we are able to praise Him before we see any evidence of His work, and simply because we know Him and trust His love for us, this is a different thing entirely. I think there’s also a humility in acknowledging we have no idea how He’s going to work in the situation, and if we are even going to like it. But He is not absent ever, and is always working in the difficulties to bring us closer to Him.

I see examples of this in Jesus giving thanks as He was dividing the fish and loaves to feed the five thousand. He didn’t see evidence in front of Him of how His Father was going to feed all these people, but He believed that’s what He was inviting Him into, and thanked Him in advance. Paul and Silas while in prison in Acts 16 sang praises before they were freed, and really without knowing they would be. They sang first, knowing that their God would take care of them in the best way. Later in Paul’s life, that looked like being in prison for a long time. Why didn’t God provide in the same way? Because He often changes things up, never settling for the same.

Giving Thanks Before We Receive
Posts
Hannah Morrell
Loving Enemies

Jesus said some pretty crazy things through the Gospels, and most of them didn’t make sense to any of the people listening at the time. One that really catches us off-guard is when He mentions how our ancestors have been taught to love neighbors and hate those who hate you, but He says to instead love your enemy. That’s nuts! There is nothing in me that wants to love someone who has set themselves against me. And I suppose that’s part of it—I can’t do this on my own.

Most of what Jesus calls us to do is completely impossible on our own. We can’t forgive, we can’t bless those who curse us, we can’t rejoice in trials, we can’t not be afraid. Yet with His Life in ours, He is saying this is possible, and even further, will be true of us as His living water of love gushes out through us to others.

Often when I get mad at someone because they’ve hurt me, or because they’ve hurt someone I love, I want to punish them, reject them and hurt them back. Most of this I suppose I do in my head, not in reality, but the attitude is definitely there.

Loving Enemies

growth

A Jungle from Barren Ground

A Jungle from Barren Ground

Pain in the summer is never fun. Not that pain is ever enjoyable, but the summer just seems to compound the frustration. Everyone is supposed to be enjoying life and the weather, and you feel like crawling in a hole and never coming out.

During the summer of 2016, I sat on the back porch with a couple of friends after my kids had gone to bed and my pain spilled over to them. I looked at my life and wondered what on earth I was going to do moving forward. Generally I like to keep a tight lid on my stuff—opening up seems vulnerable and raw. But this night was one where the honeysuckle smelled sweetest, the warm air wrapped me up in its hug and the crickets sang from their little homes under the grass. It all came pouring out, and was received in such a gracious, loving way.

After I was done talking, my friends prayed for me, asking for direction and hope in the days ahead. And the most powerful piece of that was when one of the girls popped her head up and remembered the story I had told her earlier in the evening about my back yard.

God the Gardener

God the Gardener

I’ve been thinking a lot about how God gardens. I have a little garden in my backyard that I enjoy, and I’ve written about it before. I’ve read somewhere that the greatest optimists in the world are gardeners in the spring, as the sky is the limit in the harvest that is planned and expected. Even if my crop turns out to be bad one year, I am still back at it in the spring, hoping for a better year with returns that make me happy.

The first thing I do when planting is to disturb the soil. I dig down into it, and mix it with rotting food and poop (also known as compost and manure). The soil must be disturbed before it can be planted. I bet the disruption is not comfortable for the ground, but I can see past the mess to the possibility of what can come out of it—the anticipation of good makes it worth the disruption.

Walking with the broken to find hope in Jesus