Making decisions for the future would be easier if we could see what is coming. Making decisions on the little information we have right now can be so difficult.
It reminds me of something that happened last Friday night. Church was canceled on Sunday since the building was going to be used as a voting site, so we went to the special Friday night service set aside for praying for Guatemala. But as we left the house to drive to church, it was raining pretty hard. The sun had already gone down, and it became quickly evident that our headlights were questionable, the windshield wipers only kind of worked, and the window defogger did not appear to be functioning at all. Add to that the relative lack of street lights, heavy traffic, and large puddles, and getting to church became very interesting.
I wasn't driving, which helped a lot (for my own peace of mind at least). I mostly just watched for dangers, prayed under my breath, and periodically wiped down the inside of the windshield with a hand towel. That, and I tried not to be a distraction for the driver who was focusing on getting us there safely.
The thing is, with the rain, the darkness, and the inability to completely clear the windshield, it was really hard to see what was coming very far ahead of us. Pedestrians darting between cars. Backed up traffic. Curves in the road...
I heard somebody say once that when Proverbs says "Thy Word is a lamp unto my feet..." it meant a lamp that was just enough to see the next step ahead of you...I don't know if that is true or not, but it certainly appears to fit with what I've seen so far about life.
My problem is that I don't want a lamp to light the ground by my feet; I want a floodlamp. Something I can hold up so that there will be no surprises. None whatsoever.
It would make decision making SO much easier. Perhaps a bit more stressful, since making the right choice would be entirely up to me, but there is still part of me that thinks having that much clarity would have to make things easier than they appear to be right now.
Granted, sometimes the surprises are fun. But some decisions carry so much weight.
I imagine some of you reading this might be thinking, "Well, can't you just trust God?"
I can trust God, but perhaps my difficulty is in learning to trust myself...to trust the instincts and wisdom that God has given me. It's really hard to make a decision when you're so afraid that decision might be wrong.
Some people are able to sit back and enjoy the ride. They're the kind of people who love roller coasters. The kind who, when the roller coaster gathers speed, lift up their arms and let out a yell.
I've never liked rollercoasters. My ride of choice was always the merry-go-round. It's safe. It's tranquil. You know exactly where you're going to end up.
But I don't think God made this a merry-go-round kind of world.
So I think I need to get used to things sometimes speeding up. To coming up on crests at the top of the hill. To those times in life where things are ready to start moving but I have to keep going without knowing exactly when or where...
To get used to surprises: the good, the bad, the ugly...
I realized today that all I need to do is follow God's moral will. Right here. Right now.
I'm not expected to decode the future. I'm not expected to know exactly what to do based on knowing what will come next.
I take what I have now. I match with what I know of God's will and nature from the Bible. I then weigh the situation, do my best, and move on. That's all any of us can do. And I have to accept that I'll probably do some of it wrong.
It happens. Then we brush ourselves off and move on.
It amazes me that God can bring restoration to such a broken world. That every horrible situation can somehow be turned around for good.
My mind can't comprehend it. I wouldn't even have a clue as to where to start.
Making out the path at my own feet has at times been sufficiently difficult. Magnify that by millions and my brain just starts to hurt...
Incredible.
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