We all seek it. We all want it. We all think, at one time or another, "why does nothing exciting happen in my life?" or better worded "Why don't I ever get to have adventure?" The last couple of weeks, I've realized that all of life is an adventure.
What brought all this up? I have no idea.
How many times have you wanted to know something absolute? Or for something to seem....complete? You want to know something certain....or you just want to know? Me too. A lot. But where would the adventure in life be if you knew what happened next? Think of all the adventure books you've read; theres the beginning, where you find the character. Then theres the whole of the book, where the story unfolds. You can't wait to turn the page and figure out what happens next in this story. Great thing is that you actually have to turn the page and read it to find out what happens. How many times have you just not been able to wait to find out what happens, so you read the last chapter of the book, or even the last page? I know, I have too and it ruins the story. "So wait, when did he die?" was the worst one I ever did, and it was horrible! I didn't even want to read the rest of the book.
How would life really be if we knew the end of our story? There would be no mystery (sound familiar?), no adventure, no learning, and no growing. Do we really want to know what happens?
Monday, December 25, 2006
Friday, December 22, 2006
The Mystery
The mystery of life seems to be something that a lot of people look down on, myself included. I can't stand not knowing the plan, not knowing what comes next, what I'm going to be doing on a certian day, what I'm doing in life, or where my life is going. Funny thing is, I'm learning that the mystery is what makes me learn the most.
Mystery is what keeps us alive. If we knew what happened next, don't you think we would depend way too much on it? I think God put mystery in our lives so we would learn how to trust him with our lives more. Trusting him, 100% is the hardest thing to do in my opinion. But I'm learning that I have to for everything, and that's where the mysterious becomes less mysterious. It seems like, what we expect to happen doesn't happen the way we plan it, but the things we hope for happen when we let the mystery take action and trust God. Amazing things happen that way, and the less we expect them to happen, the more possible they become.
Mystery is what keeps us alive. If we knew what happened next, don't you think we would depend way too much on it? I think God put mystery in our lives so we would learn how to trust him with our lives more. Trusting him, 100% is the hardest thing to do in my opinion. But I'm learning that I have to for everything, and that's where the mysterious becomes less mysterious. It seems like, what we expect to happen doesn't happen the way we plan it, but the things we hope for happen when we let the mystery take action and trust God. Amazing things happen that way, and the less we expect them to happen, the more possible they become.
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
Hope
Silver linings, the sun breaking through on a cloudy day, a simple smile in the most somber settings; these are all signs of hope. The hope for a future, the hope for a sunny day, the hope that all will be well soon. What causes hope? What causes sunshine and birds and smiles and joy and everything else that makes life great sometimes? God's unconditional love for us. Have you ever noticed that just when things are getting too hard to handle, one simple little thing comes along and it seems better?
Of course. We all have. That's what God's love gives us. No matter what we are dealing with, no matter how crappy things get, God is putting it there for our learning, our growing, and ultimately teaching us how to pursue the greater happiness in life; Him and his eternal glory.
When things get really bad, God is there. There is confusion, frustration, anger, hurt, death, betrayal, pain and suffering....but in the end, there is always Life. Even if situations don't turn out how we ultimately want them to (which a lot of the time they don't...we're selfish beings; we want what's on the surface when it's in our grasp, not whats under the surface where we only think we dont want it) God has a purpose for everything, and in the end will only help us, not hurt us. God's love is there.
Of course. We all have. That's what God's love gives us. No matter what we are dealing with, no matter how crappy things get, God is putting it there for our learning, our growing, and ultimately teaching us how to pursue the greater happiness in life; Him and his eternal glory.
When things get really bad, God is there. There is confusion, frustration, anger, hurt, death, betrayal, pain and suffering....but in the end, there is always Life. Even if situations don't turn out how we ultimately want them to (which a lot of the time they don't...we're selfish beings; we want what's on the surface when it's in our grasp, not whats under the surface where we only think we dont want it) God has a purpose for everything, and in the end will only help us, not hurt us. God's love is there.
Who Knows What Tomorrow Will Bring?
So this last week I've been doing a lot of thinking. Why do we wait for all these things to happen? Why do we set our minds on so many possibilities and not go for real things? Why do we insist on believing in the impossible when it is impossible? We're told in Jeremiah 29:11 "'For I know the plans I have for you" says the Lord. 'They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and to give you hope." But the choices are ours, right?
We all have choices to make, and with those choices come consequences, we all know that, and I'm sure we've all been there and made bad choices at one time or another. But There are also choices that have huge rewards.
So here's the scenario; There are two choices to be made, one has the potential to be amazing and great, the other will hurt for a while but something better will come along to fix it and it will be better than the last choice. But theres hurt there, which makes it resentful. Now lets say that the one that is good has the potential to hurt quite a few people if it doesn't work out right, but the other choice will only hurt one person: yourself. I'm not sure, but most people dont' like to hurt others, so they might pick the one that only hurts themselves. But what if your feeling led to the one that could actually cause damage? Is it worth the risk? Is it worth the effort, the wait, the trust, the hurt, the pain?
Or is giving up really the right choice?
We all have choices to make, and with those choices come consequences, we all know that, and I'm sure we've all been there and made bad choices at one time or another. But There are also choices that have huge rewards.
So here's the scenario; There are two choices to be made, one has the potential to be amazing and great, the other will hurt for a while but something better will come along to fix it and it will be better than the last choice. But theres hurt there, which makes it resentful. Now lets say that the one that is good has the potential to hurt quite a few people if it doesn't work out right, but the other choice will only hurt one person: yourself. I'm not sure, but most people dont' like to hurt others, so they might pick the one that only hurts themselves. But what if your feeling led to the one that could actually cause damage? Is it worth the risk? Is it worth the effort, the wait, the trust, the hurt, the pain?
Or is giving up really the right choice?
Friday, December 8, 2006
Life as a Story
So I was reading Epic by John Eldridge last night, in which he compares our lives with a story, an epic tale. In those stories we have plots, climax, conflict, conflict resolution, tragedy, characters, chapters, maybe different volumes; whatever it is, the elements that make up some of the best literature make our lives as well, with God as the author.
This book contrasts completely with another book I was reading a while back called Inkspell. It's actually the sequel to the book Inkheart, in which stories come to life by people who possess the power to read things out of books. Well in Inkspell, they read themselves into the book itself. As the characters find their way around this new world, the author (who he himself is stuck inside of his own creation) begins to try and change things. One of his favorite creations has died, so he decides to create a brand new one which will rule even better than the last. However, this leads to the deaths of hundreds of other great characters. The author then tries to create other things that will fix what damage he has caused, but this ultimately leads to pretty much the downfall of the place (and the original plot). But luckily, thats only a book.
But imagine if we had the power to do that, how horrible our lives would be if we didn't trust the Author of our story? What if we, as humans could choose what came next in our plot? That would be ridiculous. Millions of human beings sitting around with paper and pen and a magical voice, dictating what we want to happen, who we will be around, what person we want to be with for the rest of our lives, and every other minute detail of our lives. Lets step it up even further. What if we could dictate other peoples lives? For me, thats too scary to even think about.
But lucky for the real world, we have God as our master author, the one who created all of us, and writes our story for the benefit of his glory alone. Of course we have choices; we have conflicts that we have to over come, but ultimately we're not the ones with the pen in our hands. We get to choose what chapter we want to pursue. Isn't making choices about life kind of like choosing what book to read next? Think about it...there are books out there that you pick up, start reading, and then put down because it a) doesnt' interest you, or b) had information you really don't think you should pursue. Same with choices. There are tons out there that are good, and the same amount or more that are bad. But rather than choosing what comes next, and how we as humans can be in control of a situation, shouldn't we trust the Author of our story, knowing that he knows the ending and how we play a part in it?
This book contrasts completely with another book I was reading a while back called Inkspell. It's actually the sequel to the book Inkheart, in which stories come to life by people who possess the power to read things out of books. Well in Inkspell, they read themselves into the book itself. As the characters find their way around this new world, the author (who he himself is stuck inside of his own creation) begins to try and change things. One of his favorite creations has died, so he decides to create a brand new one which will rule even better than the last. However, this leads to the deaths of hundreds of other great characters. The author then tries to create other things that will fix what damage he has caused, but this ultimately leads to pretty much the downfall of the place (and the original plot). But luckily, thats only a book.
But imagine if we had the power to do that, how horrible our lives would be if we didn't trust the Author of our story? What if we, as humans could choose what came next in our plot? That would be ridiculous. Millions of human beings sitting around with paper and pen and a magical voice, dictating what we want to happen, who we will be around, what person we want to be with for the rest of our lives, and every other minute detail of our lives. Lets step it up even further. What if we could dictate other peoples lives? For me, thats too scary to even think about.
But lucky for the real world, we have God as our master author, the one who created all of us, and writes our story for the benefit of his glory alone. Of course we have choices; we have conflicts that we have to over come, but ultimately we're not the ones with the pen in our hands. We get to choose what chapter we want to pursue. Isn't making choices about life kind of like choosing what book to read next? Think about it...there are books out there that you pick up, start reading, and then put down because it a) doesnt' interest you, or b) had information you really don't think you should pursue. Same with choices. There are tons out there that are good, and the same amount or more that are bad. But rather than choosing what comes next, and how we as humans can be in control of a situation, shouldn't we trust the Author of our story, knowing that he knows the ending and how we play a part in it?
Wednesday, December 6, 2006
Patience
They say that patience is a virtue; I'm beginning to think it's a lot more than that, maybe a test to see where our true faith is. Maybe God is trying to tell us something. Have you noticed (and this may just be me, I don't know) how what you want the most is what seems like an eternity to finally get to? Like, we just keep saying "Just a little longer, and then..." or "I only have to wait until such-and-such until..." Our hearts strongest desires are what seem to take the longest, which ultimately teaches us patience. I was talking to my dad about it the other day, and his main advice was simply how God has so much more planned for us than we have for ourselves. Isn't that crazy?! We can think that we want something so bad that it hurts, but in reality, God may just be planning something so much bigger and better for us than what we in our wildest dreams could hope for. He knows everything that we want, but that may not really be what we want, and something so much better may come along. And then again, we may have that God-given desire and strive for it, but it's all going to work out because God has planned it out. But the only thing we have to do is to have patience.
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