Sunday, July 12, 2015

21-Day No-Complaint Challenge

A big part of this past year was about learning. I was reading books from my book shelf, and not only those books, and learning.

Today my pastor told a story which might ring true for you as well. Regardless of your faith affiliation (or absence of such), you will recognize the pattern, as I am sure you have seen plenty of it in your life.

So, here’s the story:

It is a good practice to have a prayer team gather together in a church building on regular basis and pray together for the needs of the people in the church and for everyone who is involved in the ministry. 

But when they call for a prayer meeting, 3 people show up. Why so? People say ‘we really don’t know how to pray’. Offering a class on how to pray seems to be a great idea. So the pastor starts a class, 25 people show up and actually faithfully finish the class. 

What’s interesting though, when a prayer meeting is called again, only 3 people out of 25 show up for it. 

Wait a minute, wasn’t the point of the class to teach people how to pray so when it’s time for a prayer meeting, there is actually a prayer team, educated and ready for action? Yes, of course! 


But more people want to learn something and very few want to actually act upon that knowledge.


My pastor went on to read the scripture from the Bible which talks about living in accordance to what we have learned so far. It is not easy, is it? Nope, but it’s worth the effort.


I am telling the whole story here because it directly relates to reading the books on my shelf and then implementing what I learn in my daily life.

I will take you all the way back to September 2014 when I posted here last time before I came back today, and back track everything that happened in my life since then in the posts that will follow.

For right now, I will write about what’s on my heart now that I’ve started reading ‘What’s It Like To Be Married To Me?’ just the day before yesterday.



I just finished Chapter 2 and something really grabbed my attention. I knew for quite some time that the complaining of the Jewish people kept them in the desert for 40 years. But what I read today made me look in the mirror and actually do something to make changes in my life, in me.

Linda Dillow, the author of this book gave her dialog with God about griping, grumbling and whining. Of any kind.

Here’s what I learned from it: God considers grumbling as sinful as immorality. He says it’s as bad as adultery.


What we usually do is go tell people what we dislike so much. Those people cannot do anything about what we dislike. But we go and bring our complaints to them. Not to God, who actually CAN do a lot about it.

I loved this quote by C. H. Spurgeon Linda included in this chapter:
We do not show our trouble to the Lord that He may see it, but that we may see Him. It is for our relief and not for His information, that we make plain statements concerning our troubles. It does us much good to list our sorrows.

She offered a challenge which I have accepted with enthusiasm: 21-Day No-Complaint Challenge.


The whole book is about building a healthy marriage relationship. I am not married. But I can easily apply what I learn from this book to my other relationships. I see it as a great opportunity for practice: if I am to marry for a fourth time, then I have been working on myself, I do not want to waste time now.

So, here are the steps to take:

1. I go to God alone and pour out my complaints.
2. I make a secret choice to accept the other person.
3. I move from ‘Change THEM, Lord’ to ‘Change ME Lord’.
4. I wear my ‘Gripes Be Gone’ bracelet.

About the last point – part of the challenge is to switch my bracelet from one wrist to the other every time I gripe instead of talking to God about it.

My friend gave me this bracelet some time ago. This is what I choose to wear, not a rubber one, but this gift from a person who loves me and accepts me.

Want to join me in the challenge?

 21-Day No-Complaint Challenge