{"id":107,"date":"2015-07-02T14:33:32","date_gmt":"2015-07-02T14:33:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplyfabulous\/?p=107"},"modified":"2015-07-02T14:33:32","modified_gmt":"2015-07-02T14:33:32","slug":"snowballs-in-july","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplyfabulous\/2015\/07\/snowballs-in-july.html","title":{"rendered":"Snowballs in July"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>It&#8217;s been snowing like crazy for the past month. \u00a0No, we are not having some weird sort of weather phenomenon in North Carolina. \u00a0There&#8217;s been a figurative snowball rolling down the hill of my life and it&#8217;s been gaining speed every day!<\/p>\n<p>Have you ever been there?<\/p>\n<p>Where something stressful\/troublesome\/problematic happens in your life and then something else happens and then something else happens&#8230; and you start to wonder if you&#8217;re cursed? \u00a0Sometimes it seems that one thing almost leads to the next and you just can&#8217;t catch a break.<\/p>\n<p>Well that&#8217;s been my life in the recent weeks. \u00a0I&#8217;ve been on the exciting and interesting journey of downsizing my life and having a tiny house built for the past five months, which is a good thing. \u00a0But&#8230; once it was actually delivered, it&#8217;s been nothing but a series of problems. \u00a0With the plumbing, the electricity, getting internet and all kinds of little things in between. \u00a0I guess it shouldn&#8217;t be much of a surprise since home building can be a bit of a nightmare in the first place. \u00a0But every time I thought things were looking on the up and up, something else would go wrong.<\/p>\n<p>So I decided to give myself a little break from the stress and go to the beach with my family for 3 days. \u00a0I packed up the car, grabbed the pups and headed off on a five hour drive to Virginia Beach. \u00a0The first day, I wasn&#8217;t able to get a hold of my sister ALL day (because of bad cell phone reception at the beach), so I didn&#8217;t even meet up with them until 7:00 that night. \u00a0Weird. \u00a0Then we had a great 2nd day. \u00a0Then I got up the next day and hadn&#8217;t even made it to the restroom yet, when I got bit by the dog that lives at the B&amp;B I was staying at. \u00a0Extremely weird. \u00a0Especially since I am a huge dog lover and have never met a dog that didn&#8217;t get along with me in my whole life!<\/p>\n<p>So I spent half of that day in the urgent care and then couldn&#8217;t swim or go in the ocean anymore because I couldn&#8217;t get the wound wet. \u00a0And then I went home the next day. \u00a0Not exactly the relaxing vacation I had envisioned.<\/p>\n<p>Seriously, at this point, you have to wonder&#8230; what in the world is going on?<\/p>\n<p>Anytime that I&#8217;ve had a big ol&#8217; snowball like this brewing in my life, it was because I was on the verge of doing something great and my faith\/patience was being tested. \u00a0In fact, I do have a few great things in the works right now and I do know that God&#8217;s hand is in all of it. \u00a0So it shouldn&#8217;t be a surprise that Satan would want to throw a few monkey wrenches into the mix.<\/p>\n<p>We all will experience moments of crisis where we feel like we are being hit on all sides. \u00a0And the key in those moments is to\u00a0<em>breathe.<\/em> \u00a0Just like how\u00a0you need to turn into a skid when driving on ice&#8230; don&#8217;t fight against the challenges. \u00a0Lean into them. \u00a0Breathe. \u00a0Pray. \u00a0And ride them out. \u00a0They won&#8217;t last forever. \u00a0Eventually the sun will come out again and the snow will melt.<\/p>\n<p>Just remember that you are strong enough to withstand anything life throws at you, when you have God on your side.<\/p>\n<p><em>&#8220;Blessed is the man who perseveres under trial, because when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him.&#8221; \u00a0-James 1:12<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em><sup class=\"versenum\">\u00a0&#8220;<\/sup>I can do all things through Christ\u00a0who strengthens me.&#8221; \u00a0-Philippians 4:13<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It&#8217;s been snowing like crazy for the past month. \u00a0No, we are not having some weird sort of weather phenomenon in North Carolina. \u00a0There&#8217;s been a figurative snowball rolling down the hill of my life and it&#8217;s been gaining speed every day! Have you ever been there? Where something stressful\/troublesome\/problematic happens in your life and&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":589,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[276,273,238,269,272,125,97,33,126,268,179,146,124,242,275,266,267,277,278,145,274,270,271],"class_list":["post-107","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-attack","tag-calm","tag-courage","tag-crisis","tag-determination","tag-encouragement","tag-faith","tag-god","tag-inspiration","tag-july","tag-peace","tag-perseverance","tag-positive-thinking","tag-problems","tag-satan","tag-snow","tag-snowball","tag-spiritual-attack","tag-spiritual-warfare","tag-strength","tag-test","tag-trouble","tag-troubles"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Snowballs in July - Simply Fabulous<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplyfabulous\/2015\/07\/snowballs-in-july.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Snowballs in July - Simply Fabulous\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"It&#8217;s been snowing like crazy for the past month. \u00a0No, we are not having some weird sort of weather phenomenon in North Carolina. \u00a0There&#8217;s been a figurative snowball rolling down the hill of my life and it&#8217;s been gaining speed every day! Have you ever been there? Where something stressful\/troublesome\/problematic happens in your life and&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplyfabulous\/2015\/07\/snowballs-in-july.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Simply Fabulous\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-07-02T14:33:32+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Jenn Baxter\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Snowballs in July - Simply Fabulous","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplyfabulous\/2015\/07\/snowballs-in-july.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Snowballs in July - Simply Fabulous","og_description":"It&#8217;s been snowing like crazy for the past month. \u00a0No, we are not having some weird sort of weather phenomenon in North Carolina. \u00a0There&#8217;s been a figurative snowball rolling down the hill of my life and it&#8217;s been gaining speed every day! 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