I was recently praying. And in my prayer I found myself apologizing to God. I found myself saying, "I'm sorry for coming to you God with the same requests over and over; you must be feeling like I don't trust you."
Then God answered my apology with an answer I didn't see coming. God said to me, you don't need to apologize to me as much as you need to listen to me. Of course, you don't get an answer like that from God without doing some serious reflecting. It turns out that answer sounded so challenging because I knew exactly where God was coming from. You know, full confession here, I've spent a lot of my life going to God asking him to answer prayers as a way of distracting myself, and even more foolishly, as a way of trying to distract God. In my mind, sometimes subconsciously and other times fully aware, I've asked God to answer my prayers as a way of pretending that God hadn't already answered them. Why would one do that, you might ask. Why would one not want to fully embrace answers God has given to the requests one has made? That answer is simple. One does that when the answers don't look and sound and feel like the answers one is looking for. One does that when the answers sound more like a direction God would want for one's life and not the direction one was hoping for. The truth is, I, and maybe you, know the answers God is going to give before we ever ask the questions. We sometimes ask God for something different to avoid doing what he's already made clear we should already be doing. My greatest challenge in life has never been with a God who refuses to answer my prayers. It's been with a Keith, who for so many different reasons, won't find a way to follow the answers God has always freely given. I often relieve myself of responsibilities and sacrifices and following roads I would rather not travel by pretending I have a mysterious God. It's true my God is mysterious, but my God is very rarely mysterious about pointing me in the way I should go. Pretending I don't hear the answers - or waiting on answers that sound easier to hear - does not make God mysterious. I have discovered something lately. I sure have a long way to go with it, but it's a discovery nonetheless. When I give in to some of the answers God has already given, because that's what it is, a giving in to more than a discovery, I start experiencing more of the answers I was looking for. It turns out that God is looking to make me more like him before I can ever experience a life that looks and feels like any version of me I can long to live. I know this now. Fully. Which is why I get far more frustrated with me these days than with God. So this morning I pray, God, you have already answered my prayers. Over and over. I have nothing more to ask. Other than for you to encourage me, gently nudge me, open my heart and my soul and my mind, in the direction of your answers. Because I am not distracted God, and neither are you. You have already given the answers.
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Robert "Keith" CartwrightI am a friend of God, a dad, a runner who never wins, but is always searching for beauty in the race. Archives
November 2024
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