Today I had an embarrassing moment. It’s quite unusual for me to say that because I’ve been in enough rattling situations that I’ve become desensitized: I routinely miss written signs or posts, verbal or written hints (and sometimes plain questions or statements) and jokes. Plus I’ve tripped, dropped or spilled something at enough inopportune times that I can usually just shrug it off.
But back to today. The embarrassing moment—which also was private, thankfully— is mortifying enough that it won’t be stated online. But here I am more than happy to share about it in indescriptive terms--and a spiritual lesson from it.
The incident happened at work. I had an important event this afternoon that I had to leave at 11:00 am for, so to maximize my day I had arrived at the office just after 7. I expected a normal, productive morning. It started off that way, but just after an hour into it, a curveball was thrown when the unnamed incident occurred. Now I was unsure I would make it to my 11 am event—the one I couldn’t miss. In that moment, everything said my day could end up being a debacle that could only be solved with a pretty drastic solution that I just did not want to put anyone through—including myself.
If you knew the situation, you may wrinkle your nose a bit and say that perhaps it’s not as serious as I'm making it. Or you might agree. But whether big or small, in that moment I knew I had to ask God to get through it. Lord, I said, I do not know completely why I am in this situation, especially now, but please help me—save me from drama today!
Just in time—with 15 minutes to make it to my destination on time—God delivered me from it. And despite feeling a little drained throughout the day, the rest of it was peachy:).
I draw out my account of the incident because I think you can substitute any personal crisis for it—some problem, whether actually insignificant or not, that we wonder how we will get out of.
The next logical, expected spiritual parallel from this observation is that in those moments we always have the opportunity to call on the name of the Lord, but we don’t necessarily. While I think that is a noteworthy observation, my thoughts wander to a slightly different, but related one: we all have crises, but how we view any situation depends on what we believe. And what separates how we live is not so much what we feel in those moments–but what we do with our feelings.
I think as Christians we can be tempted to use crises as an excuse for spiritual stagnation. We think about how our situations are so much worse than those around us and are the reason we have not grown. We may say, If I were in his situation, my life would be so much easier, and I would have no trouble trusting God like he does. But because I’m dealing with this, I can’t be expected to give Him everything. He needs to give me a different life!
Granted, some people have rougher lives than others—but even then, the Word of God points out that there is nothing new under the sun —the crazy thing we think no one else experiences, there is someone on the globe with the same issue—but a different reaction.
I’m reminded of the story of Job. He was given everything—wealth; knowledge; a good reputation—much more. Satan told God he was sure that if Job was given trouble in life, he would turn away from God—even curse Him. But God had confidence that no matter what crisis was given Job, in the end Job would praise Him (Job 1: 6-12). And that is exactly what happened: God took everything from Job, and he still praised Him. At the end of the many crises (by any definition), he was given double the blessings he had before them (42:10, 12), and he died “old and full of his years” (42:17).
The truth is, we as humans cannot be a true judge of another’s heart. People can show us snippets of their hearts, but only God has the full picture. Some people who claim the name of God and are in wonderful situations really have hearts that do not honor Him—but there are others who would honor Him regardless of what would be thrown at them. But because we weren’t born with heart thermometers, we really don’t know! As a result, the time that is spent comparing our lives to others—and saying why me—is wasted, unproductive energy that blocks us from seeing God’s amazing plans for each of us.
No matter what our circumstance, as Christians, our aim should be to walk humbly and closely with our God. When we do, we allow Him to refine and fill us. And when we are living the full life that we were uniquely (and individually) created to live, we stop being concerned about how our lives compare to others, or how our crises “set us up” for spiritual failure. Instead, we live knowing that we can accomplish anything in Christ, if we lack something we can ask Him for it with a pure heart, and that no one can duplicate His plan for each of us. With Christ, as they say, the sky is the limit—for all of us!
Regardless of what crises we face in this life, big or small, we are all susceptible, for one reason or another, to the same emotions. Ultimately, as Christians our ability to grow spiritually isn't about what we experience, but what we let Him do with our experiences. And if we want to see big things happen in our lives—in and through Him—we have to look beyond our crises and into His incredibly long, outstretched arms that have enough room to love all of us into our unique, grand destinies.
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