On Wednesday evening, I was lucky enough to host dinner for 10 of the loveliest ladies that reside in Freeborn County. Since purchasing my home in 2008, there are few meals that have been cooked in my kitchen in which I have not complained about the size of my oven. I mean seriously, who installs an oven that isn't large enough for a standard size cookie sheet!!! Through the evening I began to mentally list off the dreams I had - like a bigger oven as I was trying to figure out how to cook five homemade pizzas, like a big and open kitchen to accommodate the ten women who were socializing with me while I was cooking, like a full size dinning room table that would seat twelve. It struck me then that sometimes God calls us to sacrifice certain dreams in order to bless us with the fulfillment of bigger dreams. I will never have a big and spacious kitchen as long as I live in this house, but yet I am so easily upset at the thought of selling it. As I continue to learn to trust God for the day to day as well as for my future, I am learning to see things from a different perspective. God wants to give me good things, but I am too busy balking at the fact that He calls me to sacrifice the smaller things I have now. This thought gave me a great deal of peace - God doesn't want to strip me of the things I love just to leave me hurting and broken, but rather He loves me enough to allow me to go through a painful season of loss in order to bless me so He can fulfill bigger dreams.
The next evening, I had quickly stopped at home after having a wonderful night with my Bunco Ladies!! I wanted to borrow a few things from my dad's garage to get a jump start on some weekend projects. As I followed my dad out to the garage, I began listing off all of the things I wanted to borrow including the shop-vac. He began gathering things from every corner of the garage and he handed me a leaf blower. Now knowing my dad, I figured he had some funny joke to go along with why he was handing me a leaf blower, but instead he said "You said you wanted to borrow the shop-vac, right??" It reminded me of Matthew 7:9-12.
Matthew 7:9-12 “Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him! So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.
In the past month, this verse has been brought to my attention many times. This verse has had a great deal of significance for a friend of mine and I hadn't given much thought of its importance in my life until this situation. Here I was asking my dad to borrow the shop-vac and he handed me a leaf-blower. But just as the verse said, even our earthly fathers know to give us good things. I watched as my dad took the leaf-blower and with a quick removal of a nozzle, he turned the motor to its side, securely placed it in the canister and thus turning what appeared to be a leaf-blower into a shop-vac.
So many times in my life, I have gotten frustrated and discouraged in my walk with God because it doesn't appear that He is giving me good things. The perfect example of this is my frustration, discouragement, and bitterness that came with the loss of hours and loss of income at my current job. I had asked God for good things and this is what happened. I had asked him for a loaf a bread and when He began to prepare my life to give me that loaf of bread, I became angry and refused to let go of the stone I was holding. I look back and see how often I have done this in my life, blindly trusting my logic rather than trusting God. To put it in humanly terms, I cannot imagine how many times God the Father and God the Son have looked down at me and asked God the Holy Spirit, "What is that girl doing now?? Why is she holding that giant rock??" Only for God the Spirit to say "She thinks it's a loaf of bread!"
Thankfully God remains faithful to us even when we are not faithful to Him. He continues to extend grace and pour out a mountain of blessings on me. He has worked to break down the frustration, discouragement and bitterness in my heart. As a result, I can now see that it is me who has failed him and never the other way around. God waits for me to respond to His calling and leading in my life and as I continue to fight to lay down my selfishness and my pride, I can see that truly He is the giver of all good things. I am learning to let go, to hold my dreams with an open hand. And if God chooses to remove things from my life I know that it is only because He has bigger plans for me than I have for myself.
No comments:
Post a Comment