Think back to a time where you can distinctly remember God answering a prayer. I can bet with almost certainty that the answer was “yes.” I remember being at a youth camp, and the speaker asked everyone to raise their hand if God had ever answered their prayer. Then he asked to leave your hand raised if the answer was no. Not a hand in the room was raised. It feels good when you start something, ask God for it, and it works out the way you hoped. But, is God any less present if the answer is, in fact, “no!”? As parents, how many times do we tell our children no? More often than not in our house. We have the ability to take our emotions out of the answer, see the bigger picture, use our more mature life experiences to help them see that “no” or “not right now” might be better answer. But, it hurts so much when God’s answer is no. Why is that? As usual, I don’t have an answer. Just using this space to process my thoughts.
Our family has had a series of similar experiences recently. I will speak vaguely, as it is only partially my story to tell and I don’t have the permission of the others involved to share. We felt that making some really big changes were in order to be more in line with God’s plan for our life. Big changes needed to surround ourselves with Christian coworkers, strong Christian leadership, a culture that supports all that we believe in. And that door was slammed in our face over and over again. Why would God not want this for us? Why would this not be HIS plan?
As hard as it is to be told no (or told no a few times), God can see the big picture. He knows our whole story and that sometimes what we think is best for us, is in fact, not at all what we should do. This series of events has definitely been trying for us, but I think that it is a great opportunity for growth and for the maturity to say “I sure did think this is what would have been best for me, God, but I’m really excited to see what you have in store for me.”
This idea connects very closely with another burden that I have felt over the last year or so, which is losing with grace. We live in a society that pushes the need to be #1, the winner, the CEO, on top. Unfortunately, even if we are doggone good at what we do, there are a lot of other people who are also uniquely good at what we do too. How do we retrain our minds to strive for excellence without striving to be the winner? How do we train our hearts not to break when we aren’t the one who is chosen at that moment? How do we teach our children that winning at life is being fulfilled by a Savior who died a sinner’s death on a cross for ME. By judging our successes not by our gains, but by the amount of difference we were able to make in someone else’s life. Our humanness makes this a hard concept to practice and our society makes it a hard concept to preach. But, I strongly believe that I want to raise children who understand that BEST is fleeting. You may have the BEST car for 2 days until the next rich kid pitches a fit for a BETTER car. You may be the skinniest until you have 3 babies in 4 years and suddenly you better redefine your idea of a perfect body. I am so proud of my family who is struggling but learning each day that we are not winning the race, but we are running it not to win earthly prices or medals (even though Sydney likes those too!), but to make a difference for the one who created us!
The Brooks Family 