Trust in Him

"The fact is, the shortest route isn't always the best route."

We don't like to hear things like that in our hurry-up world.  We want to get there as fast as possible.  We don't want to wait.  We are like children saying, "Are we there yet?", over and over again.  But isn't the journey just as important as the destination?

I remember a family vacation when we went to South Dakota via Colorado.  As we drove across Montana, I remember looking out the other windows I noticed that you could see for miles.  As a city girl I had never seen so much open space. Space not filled with buildings or houses, just natural beauty.  Funny how I don't remember much about the mountains of Colorado or Mt. Rushmore in South Dakota, but I remember the plains and their beauty.  If we would have flown, I would have never experienced that beauty and my memory might be filled with screaming babies or turbulence.  Montana is one state that we never actually visited, but whenever anyone mentions it and it's vastness, I can relate because of that long car ride. 

 "Second only to suffering, waiting may be the greatest teacher and trainer in godliness, maturity and genuine spirituality most of us ever encounter."

Suffering and waiting goes hand in hand and both are hard but waiting for the end of the suffering is the worse.  But what does that waiting teach us?  Sure we want our suffering to end quickly, we want to see the end as fast a possible, but what are we missing out on when we rush through the journey?

My journey has been long and it's still not over.  I know that there will be more suffering but I am learning that patience is necessary when you walk with Him because He doesn't like to rush through change.  You might be questioning His mercy, if suffering is prolonged but His mercy is never failing, so why would He seem to want to prolong our suffering?  Now not speaking as anyone but someone who is walking through an issue, I think it all comes down to our trust in Him. 

We always want clarity, we want to know where to go next or what to do next.  We want Him to show us the way, we want Him to give us a word that would open our eyes to our suffering but most of the time we don't get it and we loose faith. We forget that He is a loving and generous Creator and that He always has our best interests at heart, but turning over that trust is so hard.  Like I have said before, we can't even trust ourselves, how can we trust someone that we can't see? 

In the sermon I heard today there was a story of Mother Teresa, who says to a traveler who has asked for a prayer for clarity, that she won't pray for clarity because it's that clarity that is holding them back from complete trust.  The traveler says, but you always know what to do, you have clarity.  Mother Teresa answers, "I've never had clarity.  I've only ever had trust."  How powerful is that?  To totally turn things over to Him, to know that He will provide for you even during your suffering.

It's in that trust that we learn about ourselves as well as Him. We learn that we don't have to always know what is coming around the corner.  We learn that even when things are at their darkest, He is looking out for us.  We learn that we are helpless to change things, but He is not.  We learn the value of waiting for what we need and not rushing to get want we want. 

I've turned over a lot over the past 16 months, but have especially turned over a specific situation recently.  Believe me I am scared, and even after all I have walked through, I am still not as patient as I should be but I am resolved to wait this one out and see what happens.  Remember the journey is just as important as the destination.