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Stephen Adams is owner of Insight Communications & Technology, and he also serves as an associate pastor of a small church in Colorado Springs. As a long-time journalist, he has written and reported from more than 30 countries, including Israel and other parts of the Middle East. Along with being a novelist, Steve also authors nonfiction books, including Back to Work!—the book from which this week's devotionals are adapted.

A sign on the wall of the Cuyhoga County Reemployment Services Center in Cleveland, Ohio, may not be the most appetizing message for a lunchroom, but it got to the point:

If you have to swallow a toad, don't spend too much time looking at it.

To the jobless people who passed through these halls, the message connected. Losing a job can be like staring eyeball to eyeball with a fat ugly toad and waiting to see who blinks first. You have two basic choices—let yourself become paralyzed by the unpalatable circumstances or swallow hard and move on.

Often there's a crushing load of discouragement, rejection, self-pity, even shame. Sometimes there's anger and bitterness toward the heartless former employer or a former boss who ought to be wearing a black hat—over those horns. The temptation is to dwell on the past to the exclusion of the future. Counselors encourage the jobless to deal with their circumstances just like a death in a family—allow time for the natural grieving process, then get on with life.

Adapted from Back to Work! (Moody, 2009) by permission. All rights reserved by the copyright holder and/or the publisher. May not be reproduced.

Copyright © 2010 by the author or Christianity Today International/Men of Integrity magazine.
Click here for reprint information on Men of Integrity.

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Prayer for the Week

Dear Heavenly Provider, help me to trust in you and not in my ability to earn money; keep me from ever thinking my true value and worth is derived from my career or job title.

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