Detour - How to Handle the Pain

Chapter One of The Glass Desk

Monday – Introduction & pages 1-4

Tuesday – pages 5-8

Wednesday – pages 9-12

Thursday – pages 13-16

Friday – pages 17-19

Saturday & Sunday – spend time with the Lord and journal answers to chapter one questions.

Well, here we go! I am so excited to read through The Glass Desk together.

Each Sunday, I will have the reading for the week listed before anything else so that it’s easy to reference. It is meant to be a VERY manageable amount of reading. The most reading that would ever need to take place, in one day, is tomorrow’s reading of the Introduction and the first four pages of Chapter One, but go at your own speed – if you have some time to get started today, then great!

I want you to get out your pens, highlighters, colored pencils, whatever you have, and I want you to live in this book during the few moments you’ll spend reading it each day. Highlight quotes that resonate with you. Write questions or thoughts in the margins that you can add to your journal time. Circle, underline, draw arrows, hearts, or whatever else you might need to bring your focus onto the many statements the Lord wants to speak to you through.

Yes, there are questions at the end of each chapter, but there are even more questions throughout each chapter. Let your mind mull over them a bit, and be honest with yourself. Take them to the Father in prayer and allow the Holy Spirit to bring you revelation.

I pray you will gain at least one small encouragement or revelation every day. We have a cute journal with the end-of-chapter questions and lines for writing. You can download it here. Just make sure to bookmark the page after entering your email for ease of access if you don’t download it right away. If you need to re-enter your email, it doesn’t cause any problems, so don’t fret. 😉

I tend to use a lot of analogies in my writing, and that has held true with The Glass Desk as well. The analogy used during the introduction is that of a mirror. Seems vain, huh? Not the intention at all. The purpose of using a mirror as an analogy is because the second half of 1 Samuel 16:7 says, “For the Lord sees not as man sees: man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.”

Do you know where we live? We live in the World.

Do you know who we are? We are “man.”

Do you know what we tend to do? We tend to look at ourselves through the lens of the World and closely scrutinize our outer man.

I use the mirror analogy to describe the deterioration we experience as a result of living in this World. Life is rough. We get beat up, and the trials of this life can do a number on our reflection. We try to keep ourselves clean and put together, but only Jesus can do that. He wants our hearts, and once we hand them to Him, we will begin to see ourselves through the view He has of us. 

We have to exchange the worldly lenses in our glasses for eternal lenses. Trade our earthly view for a spiritual perspective. When we do that and hand over our reflection (mirror) to the Lord, things change. Light returns, and we get perfectly fitted eternal lenses for our glasses. 

There I go again with the analogies. Sorry. I can’t seem to help myself.

Here is the literal translation; you can choose to believe what this World says about you, or you can choose to believe what the Word of God says about you. You can focus on your flesh, which is wasting away day by day, or you can focus on the Holy Spirit, which is renewing you from the inside out day by day.

2 Corinthians 4:16 says, “Therefore we do not lose heart, but though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day.” You can live focused on the defeat caused by your circumstances, or you can live focused on your hope and renewal in Christ.

Apparently, I only speak in analogies, or I am uber-direct.

Anyways, as you read this week, I pray that you will embrace transparency with the Lord. Let Him bring to your attention the various topics covered in chapter one: His wrath, grace, and mercy – your pain and motivations. Allow your heart to be examined so you can fully understand the what and why behind your beliefs.

Please share any quotes or questions that you found to be impactful. I have a few I plan to mention 😊, but I also want to post a couple of questions below to facilitate conversation. However, don’t feel limited to these questions.

1. Have you become comfortable with pain in your life, and do you feel you deserve that pain?

2. Has heartache ever been a motivator in your life, and where was the motivation rooted?

Happy reading, friends!

Oh, and if you haven’t had the time to purchase the book yet, no worries! Click here to get a PDF version of the introduction and chapter one. Make sure to share this with anyone you know that might need it to get started. It doesn’t require an email or anything.