I was laughing the other day, hubby and the kid gave a friend a ride. Needless to say they both like to tell half stories that leave me hanging. So the story was, “we pulled him out of a ditch by the mile post on the other side of the cedar tree where so and so’s car caught fire in 1987 and we were listening to Kid Rock on the car radio.”
For some reason, both the kid and my husband are really tied to the land, to the precise place something happened and the entire history of that place, plus tied to assorted trivia that has absolutely nothing to do with the story. I have had entire conversations about “the patch of dandelions in front of the old shoe store that used to have a monkey in the window” and had absolutely no idea what the meat and potatoes of this tale even was.
For them the place is the story and they will relay an elaborate description of some location and then look at me expectantly as if they have just conveyed some meaning! My husband once totalled my car, gave a fabulous description of where exactly it happened…..but left off the part about having wrecked my car. Than he was somewhat hurt I was not being more empathetic. Honest to goodness, I had no idea he’d been in an accident because that was the one detail he didn’t feel a need to include.
Drives me batty sometimes.
Back to our buddy in the ditch. After a whole lot of enhanced interrogation techniques, much like trying to pull teeth without any Novocaine, I finally got to the substance, to the heart of the a matter. The guy had missed the bus, so he simply laid down in the ditch to await a ride. They thought perhaps he was dead and being a friend, they decided to stop and check it out.
Apparently he was not dead, which was a good thing indeed. What impressed me was how he just rolled with the punches. Missed the bus, well I’ll just rest in the Lord and await a ride. A ride that is sure to come, so certain that I can just nap in the sun until it gets here. Pure faith. Help is on its way. God’s got this thing. I don’t even have to lift a finger.
I covet that kind of faith sometimes, because IB walking. That bus would go by and I would hardly waste a moment being still. I’d be hiking down the road right behind it. I’d have to move, I need to see some progress here, to take matters into my own hands. The Lord helps those who help themselves, right? This is one of those “yes but’s,” one of those paradoxes within faith.
While it is true, sometimes we are called to act, to take matters into our own hands, sometimes we are also called to just, “be still and know that I am.” Listening to the Lord in any given situation takes some real practice. He has stilled me a few times, totally against my will, and I have never been very pleased about it, but I think I understand it better now.
My busyness, my need to act, stems from a lack of faith or rather a faith in all the wrong things. Trust issues. I assume that ride is never coming, because so many times in the past it has not come. My faith often has its eyes on the bad outcome. I was practically born of disillusion, despair, and developed total independence. You want something done, you better do it yourself because absolutely no one is going to do it for you, ever.
It really drives home to me the truth in the promise, “For I am confident of this very thing, that He who began a good work in you will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus.” Philippians 1:6
He loves us too much to leave us where we are.
You can call me Scarlett, from Gone with the Wind. This clip makes me chuckle, because she says “as God is my witness, as God is my witness,” and I find it quite delightful, because often we will swear things like that to God Himself, explain how things are going to be, as if He is just a witness to our story. He is not just a bystander, not a passive witness. We sometimes forget, He is actually the Author and Finisher of our faith.
Without Him, I would be just like Scarlett today, trapped in a perpetual loop, starving, still trying to dig for roots in a barren field, telling God exactly how my life story is going to go down from here on out. In His great mercy however, He will often whisper to us, plot twist, my dear, plot twist.
silenceofmind said:
Gosh!
I’m so glad Hubby and spawn are tied to the land.
I was going to recommend they apply for a fake news position at CNN.
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insanitybytes22 said:
Ha! I am quite pleased to announce that CNN is so bad, not even hubby and the kid are deceived.
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Julie (aka Cookie) said:
great tale IB—and so now I believe that you and I are cut from the same cloth—as I’d be high tailing it after that bus just like you–as in maybe I just don’t trust God either like I should…and part of that is attributed to simply being a doer…as in I’ve got to be working toward whatever the latest needed solution is in my life seems to be….the teacher in me calls that the active learner syndrome…
and of course I wouldn’t want the neighbors to think I’d had one too many and simply fallen into the ditch…sleeping it off as it were…
and then you go and throw in my girl Scarlett—I always wanted to be more like Melanie—sweet, kind, passive…but no, I am Scarlett to a tee sadly—headstrong, fiery and not always the nicest person as I finagle things to be my way or the highway…but God has been so patient as we work toward the solution to this identity crisis of mine 🙂
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insanitybytes22 said:
Amen, Julie! God is so good at handling our identity crisis. That’s it in a nutshell.
I remember some people in the nursing home, no surrender, no retreat, and while I had great fun with the defiant ones, their peace, their joy, actually came in their moments of surrender and trust.
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Rebecca LuElla Miller said:
Such a great post, IB. I think God is speaking directly to me through what you said. I wondered if Ps. 27, last verse—Wait for the Lord, Be strong and do not lose courage, Yes, wait for the Lord—might be the answer to my prayer about a present circumstance. What you say here is such confirmation.
Like you, my inclination is to charge ahead and DO something. But if I do, am I not robbing God of the opportunity to do something more? something greater? something that will bring more praise to His name?
It is a bit of a conundrum. Am I ignoring an open door if I wait for God? How can I know when to wait and when to act? Scripture has accounts of both, so there’s no cut-and-dried answer, no “this is the way, walk in it” instruction. But I think waiting on God is never wrong. Plunging out on my own strength . . . never right. Plunging out in God’s strength—now that’s a different story.
Becky
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insanitybytes22 said:
I’m pleased you found it useful Becky. It’s the conundrum of my life, too. 🙂
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MJThompson said:
How often I’ve related Scarlet’s “turnip field pledge” to bring counselees to the point of an unwitting acceptance of an ‘anchor’ to a false belief system. Such things cause us to embark on unnecessary detours in life, because, at the time, caught up in the over- whelming emotion of an experience, it FEELS so right. Sadly, rather than leading to a joyous survival, roots of bitterness form that become a negative motivation as we embrace our future. Breaking up the ‘fallow ground’ in sincere surrender to God’s Omnipotence, embracing in gratitude His Grace, and remaining confident in “vengeance is Mine, says the LORD” is the proper determination our oaths should be.
But for the Grace of God, we would never realize as YOU so well said – “In His great mercy however, He will often whisper to us, plot twist, my dear, plot twist”.
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insanitybytes22 said:
Ha! Did you really use the Scarlett’s turnip field to make that analogy? I love it, God must have been imparting some of your wisdom onto me. 🙂
I call it peeling an onion, as in removing those layers of deception we build up that become rooted in our brains. Another good word is to disabuse, as in the opposite of abuse, to actually relieve one of their flawed and faulty thinking. To break the chains and set the captives free. Truth is a good thing, but Truth is a person, too. I love how he tears down those strongholds, ever so gently.
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MJThompson said:
Frankly, my dear – I DO give a ….!
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dawnlizjones said:
“In His great mercy however, He will often whisper to us, plot twist, my dear, plot twist.” Right now, good word. Thanks, girlfriend!!!!
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Mel Wild said:
“If I have to lie, steal, cheat, or kill…as God as my witness, I’ll never be hungry again.” Wow, that’s a good prayer that God wants to answer! It’s funny what making inner vows reveals about us.
You’re right. Only God’s kindness and grace can show us what’s inside of us.
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