Stop Or Go

Recently, God's been teaching me a lesson on perspective. His perspective versus ours. I'll admit it... I'm often one to focus on the rip in the silver lining (*grin*), so this is an interesting, painful and tedious lesson to unravel.

I would be curious to know your thoughts on this. How do we differentiate God teaching us through adversity (while working toward a goal) versus God presenting adversity to steer us away to another path?

Let me present a hypothetical example: You work at Wal-Mart. You enjoy working at Wal-Mart and have peace in feeling like you are meant to be there. You might even say that you feel called to work for Wal-Mart and believe that you are well suited for work at the customer service counter (though you currently work in the warehouse). Of the 5 or 6 people you began your employment with, 4 of them have since moved on to be customer service workers... seemingly with little effort... while you remain in the warehouse having been passed over 4 or 5 times.

Would you say that A) God is protecting you from being in customer service, even though you believe that's where you should be, B) God is refining something in you to better prepare you for your customer service roll, C) God has nothing to do with it... try harder or D) some other answer?

Obviously, this is NOT my situation, nor are the answers I presented the only way of looking at things... I just thought it would be interesting to hear how you all would reconcile the situation.

Let me know your thoughts!

In Him,
Jim

You Didn't Let Go - Julie's Song

In yesterday's post, I mentioned a song that my friend Joel had recently written for a friend's funeral.

With Joel's permission, I've posted the song for you to listen to:

You Didn't Let Go - Julie's Song

In Him,
Jim

Mortality

This afternoon I emailed my friend Joel about some songs he and I are considering working on together. The response I received was not one that I expected.

He told me that he hasn't been able to listen to the songs yet, because a close friend of his died tragically this past week.

She was apparently trying to rescue a young girl from a river when she was overtaken by the current herself and drown.

My friend wrote a song for the funeral.

I took a listen to it tonight and was struck by the beauty of the words that he had to say about his friend.

It makes me wonder what people would say about me? It makes me wonder what I would say about the people I know? How well do I know them and how well do they know me?

It also makes me realize that your health today doesn't always equate to your life tomorrow. Sometimes God defies all earthly reasoning and keeps people like my friend Jody alive... while taking people like Joel's friend.

It puts into perspective the days that I'm too wrapped up in myself to care for others. Or the times that I bark at the kids because they aren't behaving as I expect.

How well did we use today? How much faith do we put in tomorrow?

Maybe I'll ask Joel if I can post a link to the song here. It truly is a beautiful tribute to his friend.

In Him,
Jim