Lost: Part 2

Did you all ever read "Choose Your Own Adventure" stories as kids?  For those of you who don't know what they are...they were stories written with two paths and two endings and depending on which path you took, you got to choose which pages to read and which adventure to have while reading the book!  You couldn't read every page of the book, only the pages on your path.  For instance, you could choose to follow story A or story B and if you were on story A's path, the book would say, "Okay, for the next part, turn to page 27..." and the story would continue and then "turn to page 34" or whatever.  You couldn't read every page like you do a "normal" book.  Sometimes I would read it and choose A and then I would read it again and choose B the second time.

When you think about it, life is kind of like a choose your own adventure story.  We're all on a journey and God is writing a story out of all of our lives.  We face choices every single day on which path we're going to take.  As I look back on my short life, I can already see where my choices led me.  Some choices led me in good directions, other choices in bad directions.  Sometimes I wish I could go back like I could in the books and start over and choose the RIGHT path the next time around.

Here's the thing though, only God knows the end of the story.  God can see the end when we can't.  I am glad I waited to write this post because our Pastor just talked about this in church yesterday.  All of us have a destination or a point in our life that we're trying to get to.  We can't see the destination or where we're going to end up, but we just need to trust in the fact that God can.  I know it's totally frustrating, even for me because I want to know the answers, I want to see the light, and I want to know the end of my story!  Or do I?  In the movie, "Big Fish" the people get to see "how they go" meaning how they die, or how their life ends.  Maybe I don't want to know how my life ends because if I'm focused on the end, I'll forget to live for right now and I'll miss what's going on right now.

When I first found out I was pregnant, like many mothers, you naturally start "planning" in your head.  Will it be a girl or a boy?  Will my daughter like to sing?  Will my son want to play sports or the drums or both?  What will they look like?  Where will they go to school?  Who will they marry?  How many grandchildren will they give me?  Okay...maybe you don't think THAT far ahead...but sometimes I do.  My daughter will only be 18-months old this week, but sometimes when I look at her and watch her while she's playing with her stuffed animals, her "babies" as she likes to call them...sometimes I flash forward in my mind to the day when she is a Mommy too.  Don't get me wrong, I don't DWELL there forever, but I do think about it.  Then the Lord brings me back to reality and just reminds me to be happy in the moment and not worry about the future.  In some ways, it's okay to think about the future and "plan" a few things in your mind and heart about how you will raise your children, but what God is reminding me of right now is that I don't have to know everything right now.

In our MOPS meeting last week they talked about how women plan while they're pregnant that they will have a perfectly clean house and perfectly well-behaved children ALL the time...and then they have kids and reality sets in.  I was definitely the kind of mother who wanted to have it ALL planned out and with Isaac, I had him very scheduled, but when Jenna came along, the schedule kinda went out the window and that's OKAY.  I am learning to let go a lot...I am learning the things that are worth fretting over and the things that "won't matter a hill of beans in eternity" as our Pastor likes to say.

As a parent, it's natural to want your children to avoid as many pitfalls on their path and journey as possible.  You want to protect them from all the bad stuff they could encounter.  After all, you were their age once and you know what can happen, right?  Sort of.  I won't be able to protect my son or my daughter from everything so instead of worrying about all of their choices, what I can do is pray for them.  While I have them in my care, I can instill God's Word in them ever mindful that they are ALWAYS in the Lord's care even when they stray.  I can't guarantee that they're always going to make good choices or the right choices in their lives, but that doesn't mean I can take a backseat on teaching them the principles from Scripture that God has laid out in His Word.

I was thinking about this when the Pastor was preaching yesterday about discerning God's will and direction for our lives.  Is it possible for a Christian to still be lost or still get lost?  I'm not talking about losing your salvation or anything like that.  I mean once Jesus has found you and you are His, is it possible to get lost on your way?  I think it's possible for us to make the choice to stray away from God and off the path we know He has set for us.  Like the Pastor said though, that's when God disciplines us for our actions and choices and we have to suffer the consequences of our sin.  The most comforting thing to me is the knowledge that God's eye is always on me.  I can never stray too far.  The arm of the Lord is not too short to save.  I am never out of His reach.  Nothing, not even myself or my sinful choices can EVER snatch me out of His hand.  Isn't that a wonderful, safe, comforting thought?  God is never going to lose me.