Perspective
Life is jam packed with questions of why, where, when, and how long. However, answers to life’s difficulties and heartache rarely arrive neatly packaged. Instead, they tend to meander alongside our path, intersecting at just the right time and with just the right amount of information we are prepared to digest. There is a mystery to this life that cannot be adequately explained and involves a lifetime journey of discovery. Life is meant to be experienced and radically lived; there are no perfect formulas to circumvent hardships. No matter how well we plan, problems will always present themselves; the unexpected will occur; sickness and heartache will be our companions. The key is what perspective we will institute no matter the circumstance.
When my children were born, I quickly deduced that there was no user manual. And what worked with one did not effectively work with the other. They literally exploded out of both ends of their body and kept me up in the middle of the night for unexplainable reasons. But oh, the mystery of the joy that flooded my being when they smiled and cooed at me. There was neither method nor blueprint to parenting; no perfect way forward was available. Instead, in its place, was a desire to ask questions, pursue relationship, and a willingness to travel the winding road riddled with ups and downs, detours, graveled paths, and harrowing bridges with my two little ones. And I was richer for the adventure.
Formulas and easy answers never satisfy because they are deceptive, promising us easy fixes, shortcuts, and pat answers that don’t exist in our daily narratives. Life’s questions are often resolved in the heat of battle, in the daily writing of our story through trial and error, and in our determination to not quit but persevere. And guess what? We won’t find our purpose or passion in a formula either. Proper perspective recognizes that detours, meanderings, and upward climbs are in a very real way the solution as they are the tools employed to build growth, depth, and faith! Trust and dependence on our Guide, our LORD, becomes necessary and eventually evolves into instinct. For in the messy, the less than perfect, the unknown, you just may discover beauty, fulfillment, and abundance.
“Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles of any kind come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be perfect and complete, needing nothing.”
James 1:2-4 (NLT)
(Excerpt taken from Daily Dose of Intention to be released late 2023 or early 2024)