Trusting God, When You Feel Lost.

Have you ever had those days in which you want to give up?  Give up on everything and not really sure where the direction of your life is going?  For myself, it is not secret that I have education, and I thought that life was leading one way only to find that God was taking me in another way all together.

This for me was both confusing and frustrating.  The question that always remains in my mind is how can I have plans for myself when God has other plans for me?  And His path seems way harder then I ever imagined.

Through this Bible verse we know

“’For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.’” -Jeremiah 29:11

But so often times we look at the prosper part, not thinking about the amount of work and things in between that God requires of us to get there.  Often times leaving us feeling frustrated with ourselves and frustrated with God.

Frustrated with God’s promises of being successful at the path that He has given us, but not seeing the success yet.  Going through the motions of hard work but not being where we want to be at yet.

The first thing to understand is the definition of God’s success, is not our same definition.  Being prosperous in God’s eyes may not look like being prosperous in our eyes.  I am sure in God’s eyes I am prosperous because I am doing the things that He wants me to do, but in my eyes I have a long way to go.

And really that is where the internal struggle begins.  That is not seeing things like God sees them and viewing our success of prosperity through the eyes of the world.  And this is really just another definition of faith.  Believing that God has the best for you and wants the best for you even though you do not see it yet, or even though you do not understand it.  And also staying on the path despite what you see, knowing that it is going to get you to be exactly where you need to be.

For those days where you see no end in sight and the days that you want to give up, you just keep going; trusting that God is leading you somewhere even if you do not know where.

The idea of Christianity it very simple.  Either you can chose to believe God and all those wonderful things in the Bible or you do not.  You can choose to believe that God is leading you in the right direction or not.  You can choose to believe that whatever rut you are in right now is going to last forever or not. And although it seems like such a basic understanding of God, choosing to believe what God has told you can be both the hardest and easiest things that you an go through depending on your situation.

It can be hard to believe in prosperity when you are stuck struggling to pay your bills and always tittering on the edge of being broke.  It can be hard to believe that you are going to be a parent after you have be diagnosed with infertility.  It can be hard to see that God is going to bring something great from a difficult situation, when all you see is the difficult situation, and they keep coming back to back.  But if we do not believe that God can do these things, then why believe in God at all?  If anyone can turn things around and make things happen then surely, God can?  If not Him; then who?  And if not anyone, you would be stuck in the mind frame that your situation is permanent and will never change.  And this simple statement is not the work of God; but the work out doubt and being fearful.  And

“There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.” 1 John 4:18