I am a thinker. I analyze a lot. I write down everything, grocery lists, projects for the house, even down to what bills to pay with the checks for the next 3 months. I’m always making plans. I will make a plan A, but I have to also make a plan B and C and a fallback plan just in case those don’t go as I planned. I like structure. I don’t operate well in chaos and although this may seem like an awesome trait to have, it sometimes wreaks havoc in my salvation.
Salvation is all about faith. Faith is “being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see” (Hebrews 11:1) If you think about it, we live our lives completely based on faith. Everyone believes in something. Whether you believe that when you sit in a chair, it will hold your weight or when you turn the ignition in your car, you have faith it will start and take you to your destination. We all believe something. The problem for me is sometimes my need for structure and planning and my faith are in war against one another. Let me share a recent event with you and you will see what I mean.
I work in the sales environment and during the month of May, a sales contest was held. For every policy sold we would earn a spin on this wheel. The wheel had different point value amounts ranging from 2,000 to 10,000. There was also this “sweepstakes” button that where if the wheel landed on it, your name would be entered into a weekly drawing. Now, the entire contest was electronic so it was “rigged” so that many of your spins would land on the sweepstakes value. The points were redeemable in this online catalog where the prizes ranged from 0-55,000 and of course the more points you had, the nicer and higher dollar amount prizes you could earn.
My first day of spinning, I earned 10,000. I was psyched. Either after the first day or maybe the second, I won up to 23,000 points. Since I am moving in my first home in less than 2 weeks, I ordered a cookware set and a hardware set. Throughout the month, I would earn more and more points and I worked my way up to 43,000 points. I decided for these next set of points, I would wait because I wanted to get something really nice. In the online catalog was the opportunity to order gift cards ranging in price from $25 to $100. You could order gas cards, visa check cards, restaurant gift cards0, Lowes gift cards and even Home Depot gift cards. I was hoping to max out my chances of getting as many gift cards as possible to help out with house expenses.
I have some people coming to my home to sow into my life and get the house to “Letrice style” and although they aren’t charging me anything for the work, I wanted to be a blessing to them as well. I thought to myself “I could sow into their lives with the gift cards” My house is sort of far from where these people live so blessing them with a gas card would be right on time. In order to get the amount I wanted to bless them with, I needed about 10,000 more points. We were coming into the last few days of the contest and I hadn’t gotten to the point value I needed just yet. This is when the it all changed.
I got to work Friday morning and I was like “ok God, I need 10,000 points today” I had 14 opportunities to spin. The first spin was a sweepstakes. The second was 2,000 points. It faked me out because the 2,000 points button was right next to the 10,000 points button and when it began to slow down, I became very anxious (fingers crossed, leg shaking and one eye closed, I don’t know what all that was about) The next couple of spins were sweepstakes. My 7th or 8th spin was 4,000 points and again the 4,000 points was right next to the 10,000 points. My co-worker was looking at me while I was having my conniption like “What is wrong with this girl?” I explained to him what I was trying to accomplish with my spins. My very next spin was 4,000 points but it was so close to the 10,000 button that it looked like it jumped to the 4,000 point. Feeling cheated, I was like “OMG!” I’m telling my co-worker than my latest spin was only 4,000 and I finished out the rest of my spins without landing on the 10,000 button. He asked me what points I earned today. “I said I got a 2,000, a 4,000 and another 4,000. He said ever so plainly “Letrice, THAT IS 10,000 points?” I stopped and counted it up and thought to myself “IT IS!”
At that very moment, I heard the spirit of the Lord say, “Just because I don’t answer your prayers in the way you expect doesn’t mean I don’t hear them and I’m not listening. If you only look for me in the way YOU expect me to come, YOU will miss out on so many blessings that I have for you” My eyes began to tear up because I know this is a struggle that I deal with daily. I’m always trying to think of God’s next move in my life instead of trusting that He has complete control over me and all that concerns me. I almost missed out on my house because it didn’t fit the “plan” of what I thought the Lord was going to bless me with. He constantly shows me that He is in control because I often have to erase, edit and sometimes discard all of my plans; however His plans are always better than my own.
Let us pray together.
Father we thank you for who you are; the Creator of this universe and every living thing in it. Lord, we desire to live our lives in ways pleasing to you. However, Lord we also know that you are the Supreme Ruler and You have already destined a plan for us. Help us now to seek you first and Your Righteousness so that all we desire will be added unto us. I pray that we will have a submissive spirit to your Will and to be able to discern your voice from that of the adversary. I pray that our spirits will be open to your leading so that we will walk into everything that you have for us. We love you God and we thank you for ALWAYS loving us. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
Be blessed
No comments:
Post a Comment