god wants to change you not your circumstances

​I thought about this recently. You know when I'm NOT questioning God about the circumstances in my life? It's when the circumstances in my life are going just the way I want the circumstances in my life to go.

I'm happy. I'm content. I'm wearing every article of "Life is Good" clothing I own.

But you know what else I've discovered happens when Life is Good? I don't change. I get to celebrating who I am and stop thinking about who I can and need to be.

Who God has created me to be.

I'm guessing God knows that about me. I guess that's why when the circumstances in my life aren't going just the way I want the circumstances in my life to go, that doesn't concern God nearly as much as it does me.

Because God isn't about creating beautiful circumstances in my life, God is about creating a beautiful me. And God knows a beautiful me isn't a final destination, it's a process of daily changing.

I guess to fully grasp that - at least from a place of believing God really does love me when circumstances don't feel loving - I have to look at all of that through the eyes of being a dad.

My boys experience hard times. Right now they are on their 9th month of sitting in their rooms doing school instead of sitting in a classroom doing it. Whether that's right or wrong, fair or unfair, healthy or unhealthy - doesn't much matter - it's the way it is.

The Life is Good dad in me wants nothing more than for those circumstances in their lives to get back where they were. Where school was being done the way they and I think it's supposed to be done. Where it felt good and comfortable.

The dad who loves his kids in me wants nothing more than for them to change through these circumstances. The dad who loves his kids knows young school boys become beautiful men, not when life throws the right circumstances at them, but when challenging circumstances shape them the right way.

That's not a theory of mine. It's a fact of mine. I can look back on all the challenging circumstances in my life and see how they shaped me. They changed me. Far more than any Life is Good circumstance ever did.

That's why in the midst of our circumstances these days - a pandemic, cultural challenges, broken relationships, joblessness, traumas and re-traumas - through it all, I know there's a God watching over me who isn't celebrating the challenging nature of my life, but rather, he's lovingly taking comfort in knowing I'm becoming the beautiful person he knows these circumstances will create.

God has a big advantage, you know. God knows what the final circumstances look like.

What God wants us to focus on - to spend our days refining - is what will we look like - who will we be - when we take our seats in those final circumstances.