 |
| Photo By: Khayla Williams |
My sister told me the testimony of a woman who stepped out on faith in pursuit of her dream career. Like others testimonies I have heard, the result of the woman’s faith was not immediate reward. She instead fell on trying times. She was out of work for almost two years, but she kept believing and trusting God and now she is fulfilling her destiny and doing well financially.
When I was diagnosed with cancer in 2005, I thought that was
my ultimate trial. That was the worse thing that could happen to me. And by
going through the experience and beating it, I thought I would come out on top
with a story to tell and a platform on which to fulfill my destiny. But today,
I feel that my bout with cancer was actually the setup to an even more
difficult challenge…my finances. When God did not produce the results that I
anticipated after my first big trial, my entire belief system was shaken.
My faith at the time of my diagnosis in 2005 made it easy
for me to accept what was happening. I believed that it was God at work in my
life and He was using this circumstance to make me stronger. I wish I could say
I had that same faith during my financial trail, or the same faith as the woman
in my sister’s story. But that was not
the case. I was frustrated and felt betrayed. And, I had no one to blame but
God. I trusted Him to order my steps, and I got nothing. I became bitter. At
one point I stopped praying. Not because I lost faith in God, but because I
lost faith in the effectiveness of my prayers. I was not getting the “yeses”
from God that I was after, and I had no idea how to get Him to hear me. I was
not asking God to drop a miracle from the sky. I had actual ideas and work that
I put my hands to that I assumed He would prosper, but it didn’t happen. I
never stopped believing in God or his goodness, but it did cause me to
reevaluate the way I view how He operates in my life. It seemed to me that He
was not working in my life the way He seemingly worked in others. He certainly
was not working in my life the way that I was expecting. I wondered if there
was some lack in me. Am I not studying or reading enough? Are my quiet-times
ineffective? (There are Christians out
there who would default to the conclusion that there is some lingering sin in
your life, or your prayer life is not right, or you have wrong motives when
things are not going your way. (I will address
that in a later entry.) Is there something that I can do
to get God’s attention and make Him love me enough to at least let my efforts
not be in vein? What must I…can I do to earn
God’s blessings? (I will address that in a later entry). Even
as I wrestled with those thoughts, I saw people in whom there was no evidence
of Jesus Christ achieving exactly what I wanted. And so I have the question.
What is really at work here?
This is my current journey. I am questioning everything that
I learned and learn in church. I am learning God all over again. I am examining
my heart and how I view prayer, blessings, giving, community, God and how He
operates in my life. I do not want to be agnostic. I want to believe that God
has His hand in my life and is personally vested in me. I want that to be the
case. I desire to be used for His kingdom. But, I also think that I need to
change my perspective. I need to adjust my understanding of the truth – not based
on what some pastor says to evoke an emotional response from his congregation –
but the honest from God Truth.
So where did it all go wrong? Follow the link for the full story of the challenge that brought me to this place of reckoning.
No comments:
Post a Comment