Praise In the Storm

As some may have noticed, I did not update the blog yesterday. Mainly from exhaustion, I crashed early (8:00 pm). You see, my wife and I have been renovating a 100 year old house and now it is time to paint the exterior. I began with hopes of finishing before lunch because we had made a substantial investment in a heavy duty paint sprayer. Well, I learned (the hard way, naturally) that the primer we had purchased was too thick to run through the sprayer. After fighting and coaxing the sprayer for about an hour I finally gave in and picked up an old-fashioned paintbrush. Two hours later, I had a quarter of one wall finished. After eating lunch, I went down to the local hardware store to get some paint thinner with the hopes of thinning the primer out so I could run it through the sprayer. Instead of thinner, the store owner suggested that I simply use water of all things. I returned home and tried his odd, yet simple advice and you know what...it actually worked. I finished both floors of the entire house by 5:00 pm!

So what have I learned through all this? Well, first I learned how to give praise to God even though things weren't going my way (Psalm 37:4 Delight yourself in the LORD; And He will give you the desires of your heart). There are many people in this world that do not have a home to paint. Secondly, seeking wise counsel can make a task much simpler (Proverbs 12:15 The way of a fool is right in his own eyes, But a wise man is he who listens to counsel). Should you ever find yourself in a position to where nothing seems to be going right, keep in mind that God has been and is always in control.