When the Path Disappoints by @DanaCandler
On my birthday God gave me such great words to heal my heart deeper in a way only He can and to bring my focus back: totally on Him. I was amazed by how God comes close to me. I start to be thankful for the disappointments in my life, not anticipating but knowing that His ways for me are perfect. They have made my heart stronger and more love-sick than before. I'm on a path where I delight myself in God, His Words to me and His plans for me...which gives me such a fulfillment that I can't put it into words. This is the way I really like it, being romanced by Jesus. It's so divine that I can't comprehend it, but it's an inevitable walk of waiting on Him and walking with Him. He is so real to me, even when I cannot see and everything around me is spinning. I would give everything to be able to describe the beauty and fullness of it all. I'm learning that words are not everything, but the heart with which something is conveyed makes all the difference. So, let me share with you the message I received. Enjoy reading it:
At the middle of my life I’ve found moments of panicky hesitance I didn’t know I would – a sense of anxious disappointment I didn’t expect. If I’m honest, facing forty has left me skidding my feet against the pavement at times, trying to hold back time — not quite ready for the mid-way point.
I’m not sure what I imagined life would look like here, but my
resistance tells me it is somehow different than I anticipated. When the
years behind are full of questions, it’s hard to run full stride into
the future. Isn’t the midpoint supposed to be a highpoint? Where’s the mountain scaled? Where’s the victory won?
In the wake of disappointment, my real wrestle is with the Lord. When
the unmet expectations I didn’t know I had get exposed, the accusations
begin to pop to the surface, like balls I can no longer keep under
water.
Why, Lord? Why isn’t it different? Have I missed it or have You left me here, sidelined? Why would You allow this loss?
When life doesn’t play out as we’d expected, when a set of
disappointing circumstances turns into a set of disappointing years,
when the relationships are harder, the finances are lesser, or the
success seems smaller, we feel the loss of it all and our disappointment
can skew our perspective. Yet Jesus wants to speak to us here:
Look at My path. Look at its curve. And the path of My friends. Look where it goes.
And as we do, we see what we tend to forget. Jesus did what none of us
think to do. He chose to begin low and then to voluntarily go lower
still. He laid aside His glory, took on the form of a bondservant and
then did the most unthinkable: He gave His life in death for us (Phil. 2:6-8).
And I turn to see the bondservant Paul, his own words echoing in my mind and heart like a lost song, now clear:
Whatever gain I had, I counted it as loss for the sake of Christ…I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord (Phil. 3:7-11).
Paul’s eyes tell the story. You find no losses there. As the line of
his life went from success before men’s eyes down into the imprisonments
and beatings and accusations, he called it gain instead of loss. What
was the graph of Paul’s life? By worldy standards, he went from high
attainment to total waste and failure. He couldn’t have ended lower and
more abased. Discredited. Disgraced. Despised.
And the same for John, for Peter, and for all the others.
And Jesus steps forward here, bringing nothing but Himself. He spreads His arms wide to us as though to ask:
Am I enough? Even when the path goes downward and it costs more or looks different than you anticipated, am I enough?
He uses the struggles and the disappointments to expose our holdings
of all the other things — even good things — until we’re left grasping
for just One Thing: Him. He’s the all in all. He’s the gain. He’s the
treasure. He’s the outcome. He’s the everything (Col. 1:17; Phil. 3:8; Matt. 6:21; Ps. 16:5-6).
As He leads our lives, He’s not after the American Dream, the
pressure of our “calling”, or success by the standards of men. He’s
after friends that will follow Him low and follow Him narrow, those who may lose everything yet have eyes clear of any disappointment. He wants us to be able to join Paul in saying, I count all else as loss for the excellence of knowing Christ Jesus.
And I look back to those years behind that didn’t play out as
planned. I weigh the disappointment with this remembrance that my life
is hidden in His. When He appears, I will appear with Him in glory. The
culmination is sure but it is yet ahead (Col. 3:3-4). I remember the worth of the One I love and the path that He called back, “Follow Me!” upon.
Disappointments are real and He did not belittle their sting (Lk. 9:23; Lk. 14:28).
But He opens His arms wide to help me see that there is no cost in
light of Him. When years are spent with Him along that path, no matter
how many twists and turns unexpected, no matter if the line of our lives
goes low and fades into what the world would term “waste”, in Him we
know only gain.
Today, I don’t know what the future holds. I still can’t make sense
of all of the past. Yet as I look into the eyes of Jesus and He spreads
wide His arms to ask me this question, I find my heart returning to the
narrowness and the simplicity of responding not to circumstances but to
the Person. And my prayer changes:
You are my culmination. You are my high point. Come what may, I know no loss. Only gain.
And Jesus, I just want to say, You’re enough.
This article was written by Dana Candler. She is prayer leading on worship teams at the International House of Prayer in Kansas City, MO. She has also written three books: Deep unto Deep, Entirety, and Mourning for the Bridegroom, and is a contributing author of The Rewards of Fasting by Mike Bickle. With her own words: "Narrowed down, the passion of my heart is just Jesus. I want to give all
of my days to loving Him well and to pursuing and witnessing of His
beauty and scandalous love." She has been one of the women, who go deep in their relationship with God and has encouraged me a lot to keep pursuing Jesus at any cost.
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