Just Simply Amazing

How many of you ever ask God to teach you a lesson, but then did’t like the way He taught it to you?

This has happened to me more times than I care to remember. I have prayed, “Lord, give me patience today.” And it seems like everything that could go wrong… does goes wrong. I am late for everything. People ride my nerves or tick me off. I can’t think straight. I burn breakfast, drop my lunch, argue about everything, and can never smile at the people I pass by.

One day I asked, “God, can you please help me honor and respect my parents today?” Next thing I know, Dad calls me over and asks me to do something that wasn’t “part of my plan”. I throw a fit, get upset, whine, complain, and then feel bad because now I’m acting like I’m 17 going on 4!

Each and every day it seems like some prayer that I have prayed comes ringing through my head and I have to make a choice to either listen to God’s promptings or just keep living life the way I have been and never change, learn, or grow. Sometimes I wonder why God doesn’t just sit me down and give me a “Patience Pill” that will last twenty-four hours or give me an extra dose of “Obedience-in-a-Cup” and send me off  to have a great day. I mean, why do I have to go through the hard things to learn my lessons? Then I really started to think about it. If God never allowed those hard things to happen in my life then I would probably have a conditional relationship with God. I would use Him and talk to Him when I needed to and not because I had a desire to do so.

The other day I read 2 Corinthians 12:7-10 which says, “To keep me from becoming conceited because of these surpassingly great revelations, there was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weakness, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.” I was so ecstatic!! I go through rough times, live hard days, and listen to hurtful words because when I am weak, then Christ is strong. That’s what I want. I want Christ to be strong in me, shine through me, so that His name may be honored and glorified in and through all things!

A couple of weeks ago I decided to be brilliant and ask God to help me have an amazing day. (whoops! yeah, I know) So, I prayed and the rest of my day went… wonderful!! It was incredible! I couldn’t believe it! I asked God for a great day and I got one! Everything went amazingly! I didn’t lose anything, fight with anyone, school went wonderful, I had an amazing chat with one of the teachers, lunch was good, and I had tons of fun! Everything was wonderful until I got to Bible Club. I was the one telling the Bible story for large group that day and as I was preparing I found out that my bible and all my notes had been left behind!! I had forgotten them!! I started stressing out and wondering what in the world was I going to do! Well, there goes my amazing day! I thought. I was sooo discouraged, but I decided to press on and ask God to help me see the good in all things. I quoted Romans 8:28, “All things work together for the good of those who live Him and are called according to His purpose.” I walked up to tell hte story and God’s strength, wisdom, and knowledge got me through the story without hitch. After the story some of the kids came back for counseling and one of them was a 10 or 11 year old girl named Selena. She is in my small group so I knew a few things about her. She has a very hard time in school because the teacher and many of her classmates tease and pick on her. She is very sensitive to what other people think and say about her because she had been hurt in that area so many times! Well, I asked her what she wanted to talk about and she said, “I…ummm… I want to know why Jesus died.” Selena and I talked for almost an hour and at the end of our conversation she prayed and asked Jesus to save her from her sins and told God that she trusted Him and wanted to follow Him the rest of her life!! I was so excited I started crying! I felt like shouting to everyone in the whole world, “God is good!!” The Lord is so faithful and He really does have a purpose for every single little thing that happens. Trust God through everything.

~Brianna

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 25th, 2010 at 6:20 pm and is filed under Brianna. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.