One of the things that I find I often fail at is to see all those bad things that happened in a day as a part of God's plan. Its so easy for me to look at the future and think, Yup, God's got my future all planned out, I can trust He's going to do what's best for me. But in the here and now, I find it much more difficult. When I've had a bad day at work or something unpleasantly unexpected has come up, my reaction is to turn to God and say, "Now what was the point of that!" Sometimes I get an answer to that question very clearly, other times I have to think about it to realize why God allowed it to happen, and of course there are those times when I haven't gotten an answer at all.
A while back I saw this post on Facebook. It's a conversation between "me" and God, asking why God had let all these things happen on a particular day. And God answers each question, explaining that everything had happened for a reason. When I first read it, I really liked it, because it was a reminder to me that God has a reason for everything that happens in our lives. So here's the conversation.
Me: God, can I ask You a question?
God: Sure.
Me: Promise You won't get mad?
God: I promise.
Me: Why did You let so much stuff happen to me today?
God: What do you mean?
Me: Well, I woke up late.
God: Yes.
Me: My car took forever to start.
God: Okay.
Me: At lunch they made my sandwich wrong and I had to wait.
God: Hmmm.
Me: On the way home, my phone went DEAD, just as I picked up a call.
God: All right.
Me: And to top it all off, when I got home, I just wanted to soak my feet in my new foot massager and relax, BUT it wouldn't work!!! Nothing went right today! Why did You do that?
God: Let me see, the death angel was at your bed this morning and I had to send one of My Angels to battle him for your life. I let you sleep through that.
Me (humbled): Oh.
God: I didn't let your car start because there was a drunk driver on your route that would have hit you if you were on the road.
Me: (ashamed)
God: The first person who made your sandwich today was sick and I didn't want you to catch what they have, I knew you couldn't afford to miss work.
Me (embarrassed): Okay.
God: Your phone went dead because the person that was calling was going to give false witness about what you said on that call, I didn't even let you talk to them so you would be covered.
Me (softly): I see, God.
God: Oh and that foot massager, it had a shortage that was going to throw out all of the power in your house tonight. I didn't think you wanted to be in the dark.
Me: I'm sorry, God.
God: Don't be sorry, just learn to trust Me...in all things, the good and the bad.
Me: I will trust You.
God: And don't doubt that My plan for your day is always better than your plan.
Me: I won't, God. And let me just tell You, God, thank You for everything today.
God: You're welcome, child. It was just another day being your God and I love looking after my children.
"Thank You for everything today." Probably the line that stands out most to me because after a long, hard day, I am not generally in a particularly thankful mood. With me its more like, don't talk to me, leave me alone, I'm going to go read a book or listen to music until I feel like I can function again. I find it hard to think that it was God's will for whatever bad things happened to happen and then to be thankful for it. But I think that's the key, that's part of how we show that we trust Him and it helps our outlook in life. If we can have an awful day and then at the end of it thank Him for everything that happened, good and bad, it brings us back to Him and reminds us that His hand is in everything and there's a reason for it. I've set a challenge for myself to say that at the end of everyday and then think about the positive things that happened during the day instead of focusing on the negative. I think it will help me have a more positive attitude and to focus more on God. So even though its not the end of the day yet, thank You, God, for everything today.
That was good. I actually had a similar moment the other day, so this was like the double pounding... but one I needed! lol
ReplyDeleteI was standing out the corrals, about to work cows. These corrals are sitting pretty much dead center in a sandy dirt patch and this season is windy, as you know. I hate working when the dust is blowing all over so you can't open your eyes to see what you're doing. Not to mention that the cows kick up more dirt... Anyway, before we actually got started, the wind had died down a bit to just a nice breeze. I looked up and prayed that God would keep it that way for the rest of the day... and then it struck me that I hadn't even been thankful for the bit of no wind that we did have... Ashamed, I thanked God for the lovely weather that He was providing us with at that time. Later it began to blow again, but not too badly.. but I felt much better knowing I had thanked God instead of complaining!! =)