god

Better.

Heart Lessons

If, like me, eleven has always been a meaningful number to you, it’s safe to assume that 2022 should be a banner year. Like a once-in-a-lifetime year! I turned 47 (totaling 11), D turned 11, and his school bus number at his new school, in a new town was 11. I also founded Building 22 this year; DOUBLY meaningful. So all signs point to the perfect intersection of dreams fulfilled, right?

If you remember back in March, I shared that my word for 2022 was Poppy. She represented resurrection and healing to me, and I’d had that word confirmed in the most miraculous way via a sweet red-haired doll. So here we go! Hearts healed! Promises awakened! What followed was death after death, loss after loss; decades-long friendship gone, partnership vanished, romantic love lost in the most dramatic way, community dissolved. My heart. Oh, my heart. How it hurt.

I’d cry out from my knees on the floor to my Father, asking Him over and over why healing evaded me; why I couldn’t come out from under this. I’d throw myself into more prayer and worship, thinking gratitude might offset it. I spoke against any lies I might have believed out of my pain. I repented for not having expectant hope that things would get better. I saw my therapist and my doctor. And still, the constant ache. I kept comparing it to having lost my father and marriage, and by all measures, this pain was far worse. It was taking me out in an unrelenting fashion. I didn’t recognize myself. Joy was totally gone and no manner of ‘beauty-for-ashes’ could convince me that it would ever be back.

Then, on December 9, something happened. Bochy’s Place, the safehouse and recovery program that I’m working with in preparation for Building 22, hired a new team therapist. As part of her early work, she is completing testing on both our residents and staff. On the other side of a Zoom call on that Friday, Dr. Juli reviewed how I think, make decisions, and receive and express love. I nodded knowingly as she reviewed the first 2 categories. All seemed in line with the years of therapy and personal work I’d done to understand myself a bit more. Then, she started reviewing the last category; affection. The first words out of her mouth had me wide-eyed. Then she kept going. I began laughing. No more nodding. ‘This just can’t be right. This quite literally counters almost every interaction I have with my close relationships. I’ve never acted this way.’ As a follow-up, she asked me how I interact with my son, D. Pregnant pause. ‘Well, definitely more in line with your assessment.’ Then I began rethinking what had caused me pain in my last romantic relationship, and how I had been so very confused by my feelings. Perhaps there was some meat to the results.

Following my normal protocol, I took my confusion to God. Over the next couple of weeks, not only did the pain not subside, it intensified. Christmas came and my grief reached a fever pitch. How could advent, the ultimate season of hope, bring me nothing but torment and heartache? What sort of ungrateful, damaged person acts like this? On the 26th, as I prepared to climb into bed early and read the book gathering dust on my nightstand, I felt His soft, kind prompting. He wanted to talk.

And I believed Him. For the first time this year, I knew that the pain did not point to my dysfunction. I felt the ache leave and the tears flowed differently; a tributary of healing and gratitude that finally knew that she’d been created for and from big love. That lingering feelings weren’t failures. I knew that little Poppy was made in the image of her Father, and that was exactly who He’d always wanted and planned for her to be. And while I appreciated this new awareness, I was, in no way, prepared to ask for 2023’s word. Yet, I heard it anyway. Better. Alongside Ephesians 3:20, God had also given me John 11:11 (those blasted elevens again!) as a foundation for my year of resurrection. For the hundredth time this year, I felt prompted to read it:

“Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep; but I am going there to wake him up.”

John 11:11 NIV

And I sensed ‘Keep reading.’

“Lord, if he is sleeping, he will soon get better!”

John 11:12 NLT

It doesn’t end with resurrection, nor does it go directly to ‘better’. There is a gap. I imagine what Lazarus’s days following that dramatic tomb exit were like. The stench. The stiff limbs. The emotional upheaval. It couldn’t have been pretty. And what must precede a resurrection? Gethsemane tells us that even Jesus, the gold standard of righteous suffering, asked that His death be taken from Him. Jesus. There is pain before, during and after the resurrection. What seems like a simple transition from 11 to 12 is not a numerical unit of measurement. It’s a deep, slow departure, a painful reemergence, and eventually, something resembling healing.

But as I pondered the loss of this last year, in contrast to what I originally imagined as a glorious Venus-worthy rising, I simply heard ‘Yes, but what remains?’. Dr. Steve Bonenberger says it this way:

Amidst the rubble and smoldering embers we usually see the valiant fist of the survivor materialize for the very first time. Is this emotional awareness my superpower? Who knows. I do know that after months of unbelievable pain, simply coming into alignment with what He is saying has brought such peace. And the year feels more complete, knowing that Poppy doesn’t carry the weight of a massive promise, but is definitely the beginning of something to come. Something better.

Eleven

Heart Lessons

About 20 years ago, I started noticing an odd pattern. I was seeing 11:11 everywhere; clocks, receipts, license plates, you name it. It kind of freaked me out until I asked some friends about it and they simply asked ‘Well, what does God say about it?’. I didn’t sense anything specific, but over the next decade, I came to know it as a simple nod from God that He was there, and that He was ordering things. It makes sense that He would do that with numbers, as I am a lover of them.

And as my Creator, He knows what might get my attention.

With that context, let’s jump to 2019. It’s late in the year, I’ve sold my home and am crashing with a friend until I determine next steps, and I start sensing that I should visit a church in Mansfield. It’s not entirely random, as the word ‘Mansfield’ had been popping into my mind for a couple of years. Without knowing what it meant or really anything about the city, I’d just jot it down and hope that clarity would come. In a conversation with a friend, she mentioned a new church that she was hoping to start attending, but was disappointed that it was so far away. The location was, you guessed it: Mansfield. Where He drops breadcrumbs, I follow. So, every-other week, when my son was with his father, I’d make the thirty-mile trek to-and-from the high school where this church was meeting. No goosebumps. No providential encounters. I’d drive aimlessly around the town after church, looking for some indication as to why I was here. This went on for several months, screaming fits on the return trip most weeks, until, on one road trip back, I heard ‘You’re moving to Mansfield.’ And so began an Enneagram 1 style frantic planning session to find suitable schools, neighborhoods, look at viability for my newly formed decorating business, ALL the things. And then, in March, everything came to a screeching halt. The world went into a Covid-driven lockdown. Assuming this meant our plans were also pausing, I took a deep breath and laid back. ‘You’re still moving to Mansfield. The weekend after Memorial Day.’ So, we moved. Mid-quarantine, unable to meet neighbors or attend church. With zero clue why we were here, everything in me ached for some sense of understanding. The ONLY thing I had to cling to was knowing I’d heard Him.

Some months later, church reopened and desperate for human interaction and connection to locals, I dove into serving. As we discussed where I might want to serve, the advising pastor asked in what capacity I’d served before and suggested they could definitely use me on the media team. So we began showing up at 5:45am most Sundays to unload the trailer, roll everything into the high school, set it up, serve, and pack everything back up. The drummer, T, befriended my son and enlisted him to help him set up week after week. As I came to know him, he shared that he was in end-stage renal failure, and on the kidney transplant list. A fleeting thought entered my mind. ‘Huh, wonder if that’s why God moved us here?’. A couple more months went by and life changed.

On December 30, 2010, on my son’s 10th birthday, I ended up in the ER. It was the perfect end to a truly terrible night of waiting in the rain for our Uber, after being unable to restart my car at the drive-in. After that hours’ long ordeal and us falling exhausted into our beds, I awoke with stabbing pain like I’d never had before. Cue another Uber ride to the ER, where they determined I had kidney stones. While unpleasant, not terribly surprising, as I’d failed miserably at managing my physical health after my divorce in 2017. I heard God’s sweet voice twice that evening, once in the ER and again at home at 4am. ‘This is not at all what I have for you, Kerri. I have so much planned for you that will not happen if you do not get healthy.’ And so began a year-long journey of getting control of my health.

6 months into that journey, the conversation again resumed with T regarding his need for a kidney transplant. This time, it wasn’t a ‘Huh, I wonder….’ thought. It was ‘Yeah, I’m supposed to do this.’ The odds of being a match were a fraction of a percent, but I just knew. The process started pretty smoothly. I was a viable candidate, then approved as a tissue match, but then further testing revealed some heart abnormalities. Follow-up EKG, more heart abnormalities. First stress test, same result. And while I fumbled over my testing, T became increasingly ill. He was in and out of the hospital with blood toxicity and erratic blood sugar. After telling me that he was tired of this years’ long journey and couldn’t move forward, I went on a very long walk and leaned over the guardrail of the trail, crying uncontrollably, unable to catch my breath. All this and now he’s just going to let himself die? Just like that? At just that moment, a friend called and calmed me with her words. ‘Kerri, you aren’t here for no reason. Go home, and read over your prayer journals. I think you’ll find the answers you need.’ For the next 4 hours, I culled through years of journaling. And, as she suggested, found that God had been speaking to me about this for years, letting me know that I needed to get healthy to save his life.

So while nothing pointed to this happening, I was emboldened. It had been written.

He reluctantly decided to continue forward. However, the process still wasn’t smooth from there. Another failed stress test led to a cardiologist referral. Several weeks later, I had the all-clear from cardiology, and in August we received confirmation that I was his approved living donor. But now we had a new hurdle. The transplant hospital was requiring that T get a Covid vaccination to even be considered for surgery. Only a year prior, he’d almost died from Covid. Unaware of his DNR order, his parents ordered doctors to resuscitate him after he coded. So the idea of intentionally injecting the serum into his compromised body was earth-shattering. But what option did he have? His life literally hung in the balance. Given the certainty of death with no surgery, he conceded. As expected, his body reacted horribly and his health continued to decline. But unexpectedly, one October day, the clinic called. It was time to confirm the transplant date.

November 11, 2021.

11/11. A .2% chance of it falling on that date. The minuscule chance that I’d be a match. The move. The church. The ER visit. All the delays and tears. I could palpably feel God smiling.

There it was. Order.

Did absolute order follow that providential 11/11 date? No. The fallout after the euphoric faith-filled high was nothing short of a complete crash landing. I suffered from what I now know is a post-surgical ‘postpartum’ of sorts, and I struggled emotionally. The very real need to secure paying work after I’d put life on pause for several months hit me like a ton of bricks. And relationally, dreams I’d held close began to crumble, and I felt alone, rejected, and completely heartbroken. It was then that He began speaking to me about another bold move.

Why does He do that? Why, when you are at rock bottom, does He ask big things of you? Why was it after my divorce that He began speaking so clearly and asking me to step out and do scary things? Is He that mean? The kind of man who kicks you while you are down? The answer is no. There is no kinder being anywhere. Psalms 34 tells us that He is close to the brokenhearted. There is something tender about those moments with Him, where I truly believe we just hear Him differently. And when are you ever more motivated to trust Him than when you have nothing to lose and everything to gain? When I think of a life of faith, I often think of The Lord’s Prayer:

Our Father, Who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name. He is a heavenly being. He is holy. Isaiah 55 tells us that His thoughts are not our thoughts. His ways are not our ways. Try as we may, we cannot comprehend Him. Although we strive to become more and more like Him, there is no ‘arriving’ on this side of heaven.

Thy kingdom come. The goal is to encounter heaven, by encountering Him. But this invasion of heaven on earth creates a tension that is uncomfortable for most because we are earthly beings. And just when you find yourself growing the slightest bit comfortable, here comes an increased level of exposure to heavenly things.

Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Thy will. Not MY will. Again, the tension. Oh, the tension.

Give us this day our daily bread. He has committed to taking care of us today, and we are instructed not to worry about tomorrow. How’s that for turning over control.

Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. The forgiveness of others comes BEFORE the extension of forgiveness. Which wars against every human need to exact justice so that balance is achieved.

And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil. If we have subscribed to the truth of this prayer thus far, that His thinking far exceeds ours, then we do not get to understand every single evil from which He might choose to deliver us. This means trusting that He is leading us towards good, even if we do not understand the loss.

For Thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory forever. The glory of every outcome is His. And solely His.

So here I am, just over 10 months post-op. Physically, I’m doing fine. We’ve moved yet again at His urging, on to another adventure into the complete unknown. Emotionally, there is much that was left undone in Mansfield. I took big leaps with my heart and had big hopes that were not realized. Very, very real heartache and many tears. There is so much that I simply do not understand; things that I thought were part of His big plan for me. I don’t know if I got things wrong. I don’t understand why others’ hearts and visions didn’t align with what I thought He’d shown me, and I may never know. Perhaps the promises are yet to be fulfilled and it just wasn’t time. But I have 11/11 to stand on as a miracle. I know that He is my loving Father, and He has good things for me. I know that He can and will heal my broken heart. I will continue searching for Him and the good in all things, and watching as He orders more miracles.

Where is Poppy?

Heart Lessons

I met a friend for lunch today. She showed up with a small gift bag, and set it to the side when we sat down. While waiting for our coconut curry, she started telling me a story. For Christmas, she’d ordered a red-headed doll for her red-headed granddaughter. When she asked her daughter what name should be embroidered on the doll’s dress, she advised ‘Honey’ was the name of the lovingly worn doll that was being replaced. But the delivery date for Honey 2.0 was uncomfortably close to Christmas, so Grandma (also Honey) decided she’d place a backup order with another vendor, just in case. To ensure that granddaughter didn’t end up with two Honeys if/when both arrived, she paused when entering the personalization details on her order. Another very specific, albeit seemingly meaningless, name came to mind and she decided to type that in the order details. Honey 2.0 arrived in time, and granddaughter received her for Christmas, as originally planned. The backup doll also arrived, but as Grandma Honey scrolled her social media news feed, she saw something that jumped off the screen. And she knew that backup Honey was not for her granddaughter, but for me.

Each year, I prayerfully seek a single word for that year. A guiding theme, if you will. On January 20th, I shared my 2022 word, and Grandma Honey saw that post where I penned what the word represented to me; healing and resurrection.

As I allowed God to reveal to me what those things meant to Him, He showed me a picture of a little girl who’d called dreams frivolous.

Who’d said that silly girly things were okay for others, but not her. Who’d not even allowed her heart to begin to imagine what those things might be, and grew up to be a woman who then suffered loss, and dare not envision ever having those things again.

I was not prepared for what was in that gift bag. As she handed it to me, eyes brimming with tears, she softly said ‘Her name is Poppy.’ I couldn’t breathe as I pulled her out of the bag. And there she sat next to me; the sweet little girl with red hair, with her name embroidered at the bottom of her floral dress. The same word God had given me two months prior promising a year of healing and resurrection emblazoned on her girly smock of pink, purple, yellow and green blooms. The girliest of all girls sat happily donning my theme for the year, alongside her bright pink mary janes and a bow on her high-and-tight ponytail. Her fiery hair the same shade of red in the poppy petals on my phone wallpaper. Through my tears, I uttered the only thing I could. ‘I have no words.’

This same time the day prior, I’d completed something absolutely terrifying to me, including all things frivolous and feminine. You see, for this grown-up girl who dared not hope, stepping into those hallowed places triggers fears that can only be described as facing an insurmountable phobia.

But in this year of Poppy, my sweet heavenly Father had been gently prodding me to take vulnerable steps toward newfound dreams.

And with each new ask, the prodding and risk grew, the latest taking me somewhere I never could have conceived. I will share the details of this big request someday on the other side of the promise, but as Poppy looked back at me, I knew that He’d orchestrated this lunch with sweet Grandma Honey, which had been delayed multiple times, to fall twenty-four hours after I’d been obedient to His request. He’d prompted her to order backup Honey, and name her Poppy. He’d delayed her delivery of Poppy to her granddaughter, knowing she’d see my post. This doll represented everything about His love for me.

As I climbed in my car after our four-hour lunch wrapped and saw Poppy’s red hair poking out of the bag in my peripheral vision, I again cried. He’d seen it all. The fears of that little girl avoiding hope at all costs. The vows of that single mom to protect her heart. The trembling hands of an obedient daughter, desperate to walk out anything her Father asked of her. But beyond it all, He saw His original design for her life, complete with feminine edges, feelings, and frivolous sundries. And dreams far, far beyond her comprehension. I pulled up the scripture He’d assigned to 2022, inserted my name, and spoke it aloud:

Never doubt God’s mighty power to work in Kerri and accomplish all this. He will achieve infinitely more than Kerri’s greatest request, Kerri’s most unbelievable dream, and exceed Kerri’s wildest imagination! He will outdo them all, for his miraculous power constantly energizes Kerri.

Ephesians 3:20 TPT

I’m still considering where Poppy should perch now that she’s comfortably home, but it must be someplace fitting the embodiment of those consecrated words out of Ephesians. Where does your Poppy live? Is she placed prominently somewhere, ready to be picked up and tended to? Is she tucked in a drawer, only to be seen when you need to access something you absolutely must have? Is she stuffed in the dark corner of the closet, a heartbreaking reminder of what no longer fits? Did you even ever let her out of the box? Have you misplaced the box entirely? Try as you may to pretend like Poppy doesn’t exist, the Manufacturer produced her to your exact specifications. She fits perfectly. You are suitable to carry her. She may fade and wrinkle a bit, but she will not expire, no matter how long you leave her unattended. And what we cannot fathom, is the joy waiting for those in the legacy of our having followed those dreams, for they too will one day hold Poppy. Do not allow the fears paralyzing you today to thwart that endowment.

I may not always perfectly tend to Poppy, but now that I have the hope of her, I am never letting go. Find your Poppy.

What have I done?

Heart Lessons

It’s been 6 months since I last wrote, because honestly, I haven’t known what to say. But this morning’s thoughts sort of wrapped things up. ‘What have I done?’. This adventurous life of following God’s purposes is mostly amazing. And then there are very honest moments, like this past week, where big decisions have to be made that highlight just how differently His thoughts are from our own. It was time to decide whether or not I was going to re-up the lease on the house we’re living in. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I’d decided that we’d be in this home one year, and next steps would be crystal clear by the time we moved out. Well, here we are. And there’s no more clarity to be had. If anything, things have changed even more.

I felt a pause in January of this year (after my last post) to halt my new business and wait on next steps. The business I’d formally launched only 10 months prior. Only 6 months after we’d moved to a different house, in a new town, with a new school and church. I didn’t love that directive, but I’ve come to know His voice well enough to know that if He asks me to do something like that, it’s for a purpose. He is sharing what He wants me to accomplish in the downtime, but there truly is no rhyme or reason yet as to how all of this will come together to provide a stable income and future for my little family of 2.

So, I asked to see His plans.

Yes, I did. And when He didn’t reveal how these floating puzzle pieces all neatly come together, I sat down and attempted to draft it on my own. It was a disaster. Firstly, I didn’t invite the Holy Spirit to guide the process. I was angry and full of despair, and while the Power Point template was beautiful (that’s right, there’s a Power Point) it was a disheveled mess of consciousness, half based on my volatile emotions, and the other half somewhat based in truth. Secondly, my intent was not to understand, but to control. I don’t want to write a check for a year’s worth of rent without a fully vetted plan.

I was negotiating the level of risk that I was willing to take based on how much information He was willing to share.

The issue is not one of provision. He has provided. The issue is that I think He owes me more than He is giving me. Kids are inquisitive, but let’s be honest, much of their asking ‘Why?’ over and over is because they want to control the smallest of things. It’s in our nature to seek control. The only difference between that childlike response and mine was that this guilty party was much taller and had some pretty fonts and graphics.

Let’s be honest, we don’t want to see the back-end support. It would stress us out. Have you seen the motherboard of a computer? Or the inner workings of a rollercoaster? For the layman, does that help you enjoy the finished product any more? No. There’s a reason that they don’t offer behind-the-scenes tours before you get on the thrill ride or purchase your laptop. We wouldn’t begin to understand it, and we’d be so distracted with unnecessary information we wouldn’t even enjoy the experience. And, we’d likely derail things in the process, pushing buttons we had no business touching.

By saying ‘What have I done?’ I’m taking credit for having gotten myself here. Like I somehow assembled the components of my machine. I like to equate my relationship to God as my business partner. He and I signed an agreement a few years ago, and we do work together. Now imagine walking into a business meeting to review a project that’s at mid-point. There are no actual results to be reviewed, but you storm in, declare everything a failure, and without having actually owned the process, fall on the sword and say that everything is your fault. How would that make the project leader feel? Do you think you are communicating trust? In Him as the owner, or in the project itself?

Well, I am the project. And He is the project owner. And despite my very confusing mixed messages, I do not want Him to hand me the hardware and walk away. We’ve come too far and He has proven Himself too incredible to stop now.

So, let’s change our language from ‘What have I done?’ to ‘What would You have me do?’.

The tendency will be to focus on the past (done) and linger there, lamenting over what we think has gone wrong, rather than His current will (do) and the good that will inevitably come out of the finished product. Choose the now.

It’s not about me.

Heart Lessons

Since virtual schooling started this year, my anxiety about protecting my son from any-and-all damage has seen a marked uptick. And I know most moms are similarly on team worrying-our-faces-off. The worry then snowballs into full-fledged panic, escorting me on a very dysfunctional trip back to 2011, when I was becoming licensed as a foster parent. I should have seen the cracks in my marriage. I should have known that my divorce would leave a boy already suffering from trauma and feelings of rejection to deal with more trauma and more rejection. How could I have done this to him? Anyone see a theme here? I. I. I. Here’s the voice I heard that stopped me dead in my tracks: ‘It’s not about you, Kerri.’

Whoa. Are you saying that self reflection is not a good thing? That I shouldn’t own my part in others’ pain? I avoided dealing with my feelings for decades, and now You are telling me to stop?

And off I went again, down the logic rabbit-trail; guided by nothing more than my own insecurities and delusion that I’m somehow capable of rerouting, nay, REWRITING another’s destiny.

The revelations that followed wreck me.
‘You don’t get to undo the good that I want to do in the midst and aftermath of the bad.’
And ‘I get to decide what Deacon needs, not you.’
And finally ‘Often your part is simply to make way for what I’m doing for another.’

Try as I may, there is no reconciling how I live in a world created by such a wonderful Father, yet horrible things happen to children. And that’s often where I go off track. When we attempt to make sense of something that is counter to our nature as humans, we will spin off into questioning what we deem the logical implications of it. The only way to regain control of something so horrific, so unimaginable, is to decide that I somehow now affect the outcome and that my role is to right a myriad of wrongs. This logic is what sends those in the holy fight for social justice into an early grave.

We aren’t built to assume the sins of the world. Only Christ could and did do that.

Our job is to ask what our purpose is, wait on the answer, and obey when we hear it. We have to trust that others will do their part, and where there is a deficit, God will step in. The solace that I must lean on EVERY moment of EVERY day is that God is working all things together for good for those called according to His purpose. His purpose; not mine. We know that our thoughts are not His thoughts. So if I am not fully aware of His thoughts, I do not have a full comprehension of how He is making things good. I don’t get to control what that looks like. And even if I’d like to think so, I’m not undoing what a masterful Creator crafted as part of the good. It’s not about me.

Somewhere along the way, I became a martyr to being a foster and ultimately adoptive mom. Layer on doing this unexpectedly as a single mom, and, well, you now have a legitimate Joan of Arc parental saint situation. This again twisted my thinking to this whole thing being about MY cause, MY need to help him heal, MY role in mitigating further harm. God’s role as his Father gets lost in the shuffle. So, as God pulled on the loose thread in my very flawed thinking, something became abundantly clear. He knows better than I. Few things make me angrier than this input from others when they see me struggling: ‘God knew this was coming and He will take care of it.’ Behind my tolerant smile is a silent eye-roll and a thought that obviously God knew (insert stressful situation here) was coming. He’s God. But knowing this fact and understanding it are two very, very different things. My humanity continually takes me back to seeing time as a linear thing. Using readily available statistics, we can determine that the average human male life span is xx. My son suffered trauma at the ages of xx, xx, and xx, which, based on studies typically results in behavioral issues x, y, and z. If my marriage fails, that applies a multiplier of xx and additional struggles x, y, and z. Volatility surrounding racial tensions and a global pandemic further increase his trajectory towards full-fledged dysfunction, likely at the age of xx. Identified root cause: failures of the mother. Where in this timeline is the room for the plans for prosperity; to NOT harm?

If the Word of God creates the very universe, and He has already SPOKEN these good things over my son, then they already exist.

We are simply on a crash course towards the good thing. The in-between is messy. I don’t think He would argue with that. But ultimately, it’s not about me.

I’ll veer away from parenting for a moment to speak to His last point. There have been several times in the last 5 years when I took a big leap of faith, which I believed was based on very clear direction, and there was never any clear understanding why. For a pragmatic girl who has only recently begun taking risk, this pains me. There may be several explanations. Someone else may not have done their part. God’s plan is infinitely complex and far-reaching, and the many moving parts require obedience of others. You may have heard incorrectly. Yup. We get it wrong sometimes, but that’s where the whole ‘working all things together for good’ promise jumps in and does its thing. But this last line of reasoning, which I think is what happens most of the time, is that you are part of a plan that is contributing to His good plans for another. Yes, He desires to bless you in your obedience, but ultimately, this may not be part of what you understand to be His larger plans and purpose for you. I remember speaking to a coworker when I was transitioning roles at a company, and she said something that has stuck with me. ‘Sometimes it’s about giving someone else a new opportunity.’ Here I was, looking at my long-term growth potential by considering a lateral move, and ultimately, the greater need was for someone else to grow. Let’s look at the flip-side of opportunity and consider, for a moment, the fact that failures might not even be about what we do or do not need, or even some big life lesson. How much have you learned from the testimony of another’s missteps? Sometimes there’s not even a triumphant ending. But their transparency in telling their story is exactly what you needed to hear to avoid a landmine. Their ‘Well, at least I know what NOT to do next time’ was your segue into successfully navigating some rough waters. As a parent, what opportunities do we have to introduce our kids to an idea or experience, and then step back and let God take it from there? It would be myopic to think that the role of parents does not greatly alter the lives of our children, but where have we significantly overstepped and removed the opportunity for God to do what He needs to do?

Here’s a mind-blower; maybe part of my role in my son’s life is simply logistics.

Maybe it’s a big part. God wanted him in this town, at a specific school, in a specific church, playing with specific teams, making specific friends. The bold moves that I made in stepping out in faith may not have evidence of a providential encounter. Maybe I am simply the car that drives him to the house, to go to the school and church, to meet the friends. Maybe it’s not about me.

Be encouraged, however begrudgingly, that even if it’s not about you, it is always for you. Take a cue from Carrie Underwood and turn over the wheel. You are destined for big, huge, wonderful things; some so overwhelming that it will make your heart hurt (in the best possible way). But assuming the weight of the outcome will only hurt you physically and emotionally. And in your state of disrepair you will miss the beauty of all things working together for good.