Many of you know that I am an
ultra organizer and planner.
I'm also not the most flexible person
although I have grown in this area over the years--
out of necessity.
My time with Ingrid, my Spiritual Director last week
was wonderfully enlightening--
freeing actually.
Truthfully, I'm embarrassed to express
the fullness of what I have learned
as it reveals
the deception within my own soul
But I will turn my back on pride and divulge anyway--
another area I'm growing in (denouncing pride that is)
I was sharing with Ingrid my word for 2015--
Courage,
and how the blank pages of the coming year
unnerve me and I need the courage
to trust God's ways.
She responded with simplicity but it so moved me!
Life, she said, can be looked at in one of two ways--
1. I'm moving through time
2. I'm just here and life comes to me--I in turn receive it and respond to it.
Trust God to bring life!
She went on to remind me that "making life" is an illusion.
Very little of it unfolds as I have planned.
For sure I need to prepare and plan my days, but just as much,
I must hold all things loosely.
All is tentative.
If my plans are changed, this then
is the life God is giving me.
I suppose on the surface I am aware that my plans are often
interrupted,
detoured,
or quashed,
but I don't receive and respond with grace--
at least not as often I should.
At times I am
frustrated
annoyed
angry
disillusioned
James would say I am arrogant--
"Come now, you who say,
'Today or tomorrow, we shall go to such and such a city,
and spend a year there
and engage in business
and make a profit.
Yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow.
You are JUST a vapor
that appears for a little while
and then vanishes away.
Instead, you ought to say,
'If the LORD WILLS,
we shall live and also do this or that.'
But as it is,
YOU BOAST IN YOUR ARROGANCE,
ALL SUCH BOASTING IS EVIL.'"
--James 4:14-16
Ouch.
As much as such a rebuke "smarts",
I welcome it as
a grace from God.
Because it's "freeing" me.
It's also timely.
The "life" that has come to me in the past week
has completely disrupted my days.
Much on "my agenda" has either been
scaled way back,
wholly disrupted,
or been stroked off my list.
I have no idea how long this "life"
will stay with me.
And yet surprisingly,
I'm receiving it
and responding to it
as God's gift to me.
Yes...a gift.
It doesn't mean I understand the "why"
or that I'm enjoying it,
but I am trusting
that He is wise and good
and yes,
trustworthy.
And I am looking for Him
in the midst of my
"now"
for whatever He is purposing to reveal.
And I am looking for Him
in the midst of my
"now"
for whatever He is purposing to reveal.
I only ask for grace
to glorify Him
through this "life"
that I'm receiving.
