I'm such a stubborn person – and often, like you, I'm not prone to quickly trust God when hardships hit. But I'm learning. Even after all these years, I'm learning. I’m learning. I can think back to my high school friend, Bobby, who never did take God seriously until trouble hit me. Bagging a football scholarship to a Big Ten university consumed all his attention, it did, but in his sophomore year at Nebraska, he got slammed on the five-yard-line. Two surgeries and three sidelined seasons later, Bobby had done some serious thinking. Life was short… he was thinking where are my priorities? Today, Bobby is still into sports (he coaches the Tiny Tornadoes after work). But his priorities are straighter. Bible study and prayer get their chunk of time on Bobby’s schedule now. And I don’t think it would have happened – Bobby doesn’t think it would have happened – had it not been for those injuries on the 5-yard-line.
Then look what happened to my neighbors who used to live down the street. Being from California, they were just a tad materialistic. But last year when Brian lost his job, he prayed harder, got by with less, and learned some lessons. They discovered that family means more than possessions, that community college wasn’t so bad for their Princeton-bound daughter, and that God took care of them while they climbed back on their feet. I don’t think my old neighbors would have learned all that had it not been for Brian losing his job.
And, finally, I'm thinking of my 26-year-old cousin whose girlfriend had returned the engagement ring. He let it sit on his dresser for months as a monument to his failed love life. He dealt with his grief by pouring himself into a troubled kid who lived two doors down and had never known a father. My cousin took him to the stables on weekends and taught him to ride horseback. It made the jilted cousin grow up. He learned that his problems were super-small. Two years later my cousin ducked into a bookstore to buy a present and spied this girl with a really great smile flipping through a calendar of horses. They got to talking and discovered they had more in common than just equines. My cousin took her riding the next weekend, joined the singles group at her church, and not long afterward, she said a big “yes!” when he popped the question on her front porch. Today, he shudders to think that he could have missed her. And, frankly, it just wouldn’t have all panned out that way had he never felt the heartache of being rejected by his first girlfriend.
Oh, who can understand the ways of God! We are never able to figure out God's plan and purpose at the time – it’s always so mysterious, so beyond our figuring out! But with time and with prayer, the daylight dawns and we discover what Jeremiah told us so many centuries ago, that God's plans for us really are full of hope and a future. Friend, today that’s something to remember the next time hardship hits you.
Used by permission of
JONI AND FRIENDS
P.O. Box 3333
Agoura Hills, CA 93176
© Joni and Friends