Wednesday, February 25, 2009

D-Day

Well, D-day has arrived and I am still not fully employed. So I'm sitting here trying to decide how to word the "Dear John" (or Ed, as the case may be) letter to my landlord telling him that I'm moving out at the end of March. Next comes the packing, finding a storage unit, changing the address on anything mail related, etc. Oh joy.

I've got to admit that I'm a bit disappointed. Somewhere deep inside I think I figured that God would swoop in at the last second and drop a job in my lap, or a check in my mail or something. Of course that could still happen and then all I'll have to do is find a new apartment.

On the upside, I've made it since last Thursday without having a complete breakdown.

I'm trying to decide if my struggle with all of this relates to my having issues with trusting the Lord or with my innate nature (aka being a control freak). Many years ago a friend accused me of not trusting the Lord over an issue and I adamantly denied it claiming that I totally trust the Lord. I know that he doesn't intend anything evil/bad/unprofitable/fill-in-the-blank-here for me; I just struggle with wanting to know what he does intend so that I can prepare for it and be at peace over what comes next whatever it may be. It's an argument that I've repeated at multiple times over the intervening years.

But everything that is going on in my life right now is forcing me to reexamine this question and ask "is it possible to really trust the Lord AND be a control freak?"

2 comments:

chantell said...

Wow, Denelle, I can really relate to your struggle right now.

I'm set to graduate with my Master's in August, and though I do have temporary plans afterward, I can't say that I have any long term goals or prospects, employment or otherwise.

I'm a control freak, and I'm learning how to trust God too. In answer to your question, I lean towards saying that it's impossible to be a control freak and trust God at the same time. If were possible, I'd say it's pretty frustrating possibility, fraught with tension and contradiction.

Still trying to control things implies that you haven't given God complete control which implies that you don't "really" trust Him . . . supposedly.

But then part of you knows that you do trust God . . . else you wouldn't have gone down the roads you've gone down. You wouldn't have made the choices you've made to end up in the place you are now had you not trusted God, right?

It's a toughie, to say the least. Trusting God is the hardest easy thing to do.

Brian Holiman said...

Mother Teresa once said in response to the question, "will you please pray that I will have clarity", "No I will not pray for you to have clarity. Instead, I will pray for you to trust God. If you have clarity, then there is no need to trust".

Very powerful words from Mother Teresa. The essence of the Christian existence is simply Trust. There is nothing else. He desires our trust more than we even realize it. So if we knew what He intended, then trust is no longer required.

The test of our Christianity is this, do we trust Him in spite of unanswered prayer, continued troubles and trials or do we abandon our trust in the absence of answered prayers?