When I Grow Up

Kids often have heroes they want to pattern themselves after:  a professional athlete, a beautiful movie star or some other famous person.  They may try to look like that person or otherwise emulate him or her.  Do we ever grow out of that desire?   Maybe knowing someone who just seems to “have it all together” so we admire (and even envy them) and then want to be like them.  My friend, Faith, had been that for me because she always seemed to bring the fragrance of Christ with her; she brought an assurance of His love and made people around her feel as though they had been in His very presence when she was around.  I’m not talking about her essence substituting for Christ, but simply that she radiated His love and acceptance as she pointed others not to herself but to Him.  As a Christian, who wouldn’t want to do that?

I have another friend (yes, I am blessed!)  who has been through an incredible journey over the last many years as her husband developed Alzheimer’s and gradually declined mentally.  Judy devoted her entire being to taking care of him for years until it became beyond what one person could handle and he had to go into a care center.  She struggled with the decision and was eventually led to do so.  That was not without its difficulties and bumps in the road.  This friend is a nervous person by nature.  She was losing weight and everyone around her could see the toll this was on her.

Fast forward several months.  She has settled into her new normal, going to visit her husband and otherwise living alone for the first time ever.  We meet every so often for breakfast and the last time we got together the change in her was obvious.  This one who was stressed, exhausted and constantly in a state of turmoil and worry suddenly seemed relaxed, calm and rested.  I should add that she has always been a person of prayer, so serious about it in fact that, unlike most people today, she still gets down on her knees before the Lord – even in her 80s.  We have prayed for each other for a long time.  Over the course of all that time, she has shared  many stories of how God answered her prayers over the years, how she could see Him work.

This new person sitting across from me had decided to give up control to the God who made us and loves us.  She vowed to leave her requests and whatever she thought she needed with Him instead of trying to tell Him what to do.  Instead of trying to micro-manage.  What a novel idea!  Isn’t that what we are told to do in God’s Word?  Yet, how many of us actually do that?  Oh, sure.  We pray and ask God for this and that.  We get up from our prayer and most of us have already picked the problem back up again.  Why?  So we can haul it around???  She explained to me that she began to ask God to help her leave everything with Him instead of stressing about it and wanting it to be the way she thought it should be.  She also admitted that the first week was hard.  Does this sound like trying to break free from an addiction?  Yes, our tendency is to go back to the same ole thing and pick it up again – and again – and again…When will we ever learn?  She then relayed some things that had happened since then and some ways that God had worked (now more than two months out) and how He had blessed her since she had chosen this path.  Wonderful gifts and blessings she might have missed out on, had she continued to try to “right the ship”.

Does this all mean that we sit in a chair and let God do everything?  Some would take it that far.  No, God is probably not going to do your grocery shopping (though He might send someone  to help, if you were truly in need).  He’s not going to go to work for you (though He might steer you to the right job).  But, it does mean that He can handle – for example – things in the lives of our loved ones better than we can.  He knows their situation better and loves them even more than we do.  He understands society and the world’s issues far better than we can.  He’s been through MANY societies and world problems over centuries.  We’ve only been around a few years.  Besides, He made and created the world.

That day over breakfast, I decided there was another person I’d like to emulate when (if ever) I grow up.  She sat across from me so calm and assured that God could deal with all the things that had previously kept her up at night.  He didn’t need her to “attempt” to interfere or worry.  I wanted that, too.  How about you?

“Cast your cares (anxieties) on the Lord for He cares for you…”  (1 Peter 5:7)