It is one thing for us, as
individuals, to say that we trust God with everything in our lives. Actually, it is a pretty massive thing truth
be told and, for the most part, many (if not all) of us do not truly realize
just how far reaching that is until God brings each thing in front of our
faces. And, if you are like me, you
probably are a bit more resistant to some things than others. We may trust Him with some things, but have a
much harder time with even the idea of others.
For me, one of the big ones was relationships. Trusting God with the relationships in my
life sounded great, but really, I kept a pretty firm grip on things. In case you are curious, the results tended
to be less than wonderful, which is why I now try to trust Him even with the
relationships in my life. I tend to make
a pretty big mess of things as a rule, while He on the other hand, well let’s
just say things work out a whole lot better.
And it is actually relationships that are part of the focus today.
Once upon a time, I ran. I do not mean I ran a marathon nor do I mean
I ran from something “mad and hairy” intent upon seeing if I was crunchy or
tasted good with ketchup. No, I ran from
God. I had gone through a rough spot in
my life and my faith was already less than stable. I had stopped pursuing God and thus, kind of
left myself wide open. I was just kind
of surviving, for lack of a better way to put it.
So in that time and place, I had
started to drift, then wander, then into a full out sprint in the opposite
direction. I embraced ways of living
that I had not done so before. I went
back to some old behaviors, habits and attitudes. And those that God has been telling me to
walk away from, yeah, those I jumped into with both feet. I was running from Him. Yet somehow, even during that time of
insanity, I always still knew Him. I
cannot even give a reason for that because I surely should not have, but I did
even if I was trying to outrun Him (in case you wonder how it works to try and
outrun God, check out Jonah).
This went on for quite some time,
my running away. Until one day, out of
literally nowhere, He came and called me back.
The only thing I can tell you is that I was in a place where all of
those habits and vices seemed useless, hollow and empty. As you may guess, I was pretty devastated
when I realized what I had done and where I had gone – the guilt was horrifying
to be honest – until He started explaining some things to me.
"My sheep listen to my
voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they
shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has
given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s
hand." John 10: 27-29
Do me a favor: make a fist, as though you were grasping
something precious in your fist. Now
tell me, how far exactly can it get from you?
Arms length. Arms length is as
far as it can get away from you and arms length is as far away as I got from
God. It seemed like a million miles, but
to Him, it was just arms length.
The hollowness I came to know
with many of those old vices also spoke volumes. In Ecclesiastes the teacher exclaims that “everything
is meaningless” and that’s true. All
those old things made promises they could not keep – they were empty and hollow
in the end. As “good” as many may have
felt in the moment, in the end, they just left me feeling empty.
So what does this have to do with
relationships? Well, the relationship
with God could be an obvious tie in, but that is not the one I am focusing on
today.
We ALL walk our own walk; we all
live our own life. No one could have
walked where I have walked except for me and I would not have learned what I
learned apart from that walk and those experiences. Knowing that is one reason why, when faced
with a rough change, I frequently pray that I learn whatever I need to learn
and change however I need to change quickly, rather than praying for it to
end. Not the easiest thing to pray for
oneself. It is massively hard to pray
for someone you care about who has hit a rough spot and is running from
God. But honestly, that is probably the
best prayer you can offer, otherwise, if things end too quickly or they do not
learn/change, then they will have to go through something probably even worse
later on since they already got through round one without getting the point.
It is easier for us to surrender
ourselves to God and His will than it is for us to surrender our loved ones to
Him but it is the best we can possibly do.
After all, we cannot truly change ourselves, how can we ever think we
can change another.
So if someone you know is running
from God, it may be hard to do, but take a bit of heart – they need to walk
their walk just as you need to walk yours.
Be there for them, love them for who they are not what they do or don’t
do and pray that they learn <whatever> quickly, for mercy for them and
pray they come back to God, but try not to pray that it ends before He is done. And if it is you that is running: take heart, He is not as far as you think - just stop running and come home.
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