I am a planner by nature. I have my whole life perfectly mapped out… everything is going great, except that I am running two years behind schedule. Haha… I think it is funny that I still think I can plan my own future.
“Trust in the LORD with all of your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will direct your paths.”
This last year, countless people have emailed, texted, written, or spoken this scripture to me. I think God is trying to tell me something!
I can follow this scripture pretty well. I trust the LORD. I acknowledge the Lord. I know that God will direct my path.
But I have forgotten the portion of scripture that the promise is contingent on; “and lean not on your own understanding.” Here is where I struggle. I try to control my future and my life.
Over the last two years I have felt like I have moved farther and farther away from my career goals. But these past two years I have learned that God is faithful, He will never leave me, God has a plan for my life, and hardest of all….I am not in control.
Last night at church my pastor was talking about how faith and action go hand-in-hand. We, as followers of Christ, cannot have faith in God and then not do what he calls us to do.
God told Abraham he would have multiple descendants, and twenty plus years later God fulfilled His promise of giving Isaac to Abraham and Sarah. The 20+ years in between Gods promise and the fulfillment of His promise, is where Abraham’s faith was grown.
These past 2 years have been really HARD for me. And to say that I have been patiently waiting on the LORD would be far from true. I continually complain (and cry) asking God why he has forgotten me. I cannot imagine if God had me wait for 20+ years.
Patience is a virtue
…that I have not learned.
After Isaac is born, some time goes by and God asks Abraham to sacrifice Isaac. And Abraham is willing to do it. His faith in God was tested by his action to listen to God. If God would have asked Abraham to sacrifice Isaac and Abraham would have responded, “God I love you and trust you, BUT….” Abraham would not have had faith in God. My old pastor always says, you cannot use the words, “but” and “God” in the same sentence.
God I love you, but…
God I trust you, but….
God you are faithful, but…
God your word says, but…
God you are calling me, but….
God is not our God if we are not obeying him. This is really convicting for me. This morning in the book Natalie and I are reading (“Wired for a life of worship”) we have been learning that we are ALL worshipers. Every single person, all day long, worships. The question is, who are we worshipping?
In the margin of my book I wrote:
“Even though I do not feel like worshipping, I should
because I will be worshipping anyway.”
This was really powerful to read in my own handwriting. The night before, I was feeling pretty depressed and I felt like I should read my bible. Instead I chose to watch the cooking channel for countless hours. Last night even though I did not “feel” like worshipping, I was worshipping. The sad thing is that I chose to worship TV instead of God.
I need to be continually reminded what our wise Megs taught us:
“Cling to what is good, hate what is evil.”
I love you girls!
Ashby
Fito, This was so powerful. Wow, I am really guilty of not truly letting God take over all areas of my life. I think that most the time I am trusting in Him, but you're so right, I still have my life planned how I think it should go. Michael always has a great saying when I he comes up with situations in which he has no idea what he is going to do. I ask him, "What are you going to do about that....that is a really big deal." He responds, "Im gonna let go, and let God" I love that. Its chessy but he always means it. He is a great example to me of what it looks like to just let God be in control of your life and just pick up and trust God through it all. And Michael has been through A LOT over the past 2 years, and it all hasnt been anything he expected.
ReplyDeleteAnyways, this was so encouraging to me. And convicting. I love you. Thanks for this!
N
Love this! I feel that this also goes hand in hand with what I read the other night in Job 1 and how even when we have a plan for ourselves and everything seems to be going great in that plan or that life that we have mapped out for ourselves; we need to remember that if a wrench gets thrown into it that we continue to praise God regardless of the interruption. In this story Job had the perfect life and had truly been blessed by God, but in an instant everything was taken away, however in Job 1:21 Job responded: "Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked I will depart. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; may the name of the Lord be praised." Wow this passage really speaks to me because so often we forget that the Lord has provided so many opportunities and with those opportunities we took them with open arms, but when one door closed and another opened on a different path do we then still rejoice in his name?? To me this is really powerful and reminds me that "Not our will be done, but his" Love you Ash and thanks for the reminder of the lesson from Sunday Night!
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ummmm have you been reading my mind??!!! I am SO guilty of this! Trusting God...IF it works in my time frame....trusting God BUT....wow, 20 years to wait for a child. WOW talk about faith and patience and love for God. Thank you for your honesty Ash, it is encouraging to see I am not the only one who struggles and has hard times following and obeying. This was so perfect, thank you! I love you...I was just telling David again last night, every single time I read the scripture "He who began a good work in you will be faithful to complete it" you beautiful face pops into my mind. Seriously EVERY SINGLE TIME! God has been so present in your life thus far and has brought you to where you are through some extremely hard times, and he did not bring you here just to drop you. He brought you here to do great things! I am so beyond confident in this! And you already are doing great things Ash! May not be in your mapped out plan but trust me when I say you are doing great things! wow I have SO much to say to you! You have been on my heart! Can't wait to talk this weekend! love you, Megs
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