COUNT THE WINS

I really can't remember when this interaction happened. I feel like it was Decemberish, but I could not nail down an exact date for you. Which is horrible, because what happens next truly changed my life.

Unfolding my tingly legs from underneath me, I pulled myself up using the side of my bed. Sliding across the comforter, mostly likely dodging a dog or two, as they think what's mine is theirs, I felt prepared and ready for the next portion of my evening routine. With the prayer complete, it was time for scripture study.

Stretching as far as I could to retrieve my journal from my nightstand without actually having to get up, a set of words whispered in my mind struck me.

"Count the wins more than the losses."

I've spent a lot of the last year moaning and groaning about how I couldn't hear my Savior speaking to me anymore. I was confused about what I'd done to lose my connection with the Spirit. And outraged that I was seemingly abandoned in my biggest time of need.

But, I'm sure as someone with more brains than I could clearly see, I was never alone. He was speaking to me, all along. I just wasn't listening. I didn't recognize His voice, because I didn't really know Him.

Now, on that fateful night in Decemberish, I knew it instantly. This was the Lord speaking to me. How did I know that? Because it felt like Him.

I have spent so much of my twenty-eight years misrepresenting God in my mind. Not understanding His love. Being fearful of imperfection. Missing the entire reason behind everything I did, behind everything He did, and behind the very point of life: Having a relationship with Him.

It blew my mind that it could all be so simple. That His goal, that my goal, should be to know Him. That was it. Rather than be hung up on what I could or could not do, how righteous or unrighteous I was, or how blessed or not blessed I felt, as I focused on Him, everything else faded into the background.

And what replaced the fear and the anxiety and the heartache? Peace, and a love that overwhelmed me.

So, when I heard Him whisper to me, "Count the wins more than the losses", I was ready for it. And I knew to take that message to heart. To live by it. To trust that just as with all the other things He had encouraged and commanded me to do, it would bring me closer to Him. And by doing that, all would fall into place.

Because, that's who Christ is, right? Someone who counts our wins more than our losses. Someone who sees us at our best. Someone who is an awe of our potential, when it is we who would should be an awe of Him. Someone who celebrates every single victory, even the ones we feel don't deserve it. Someone who recognizes the mishaps for what they are, stepping stones along the way.

That, is who Christ is. It really, really is. He is forgiveness and hope and joy and second chances and peace and charity and every good thing. His love is a love that changes people.

He is also truth. The Lord is pure truth. He knows us far better than anyone else. He has suffered what we have suffered, endured what we have endured, and sat with us at our lowest point. He knows us inside and out, our motivations and the thoughts we wish we could abandon and the things we would give anything to take back. He knows us at our worst.

And yet? He doesn't want us to focus on that. He wants us to see ourselves as He does. Wants us to see Him, because doing so will help us to see those wins even more. He wants us to progress, and teaches us that narrowing in on where we lack will not aid us in that process, no matter how much we think it will.

With all of His glory, with all of His knowledge, with all of His love, Christ has this mindset. So we should, too.

"Count the wins more than the losses."