All too often we are faced with decisions we don't want to make, don't know how to make, have never made before--seemingly without any direction on what we should decide. Life is full of conundrums, riddles, impossible situations, and times when no answer is a good one.
In short, sometimes life throws a curve ball that seems impossible to hit, or spins us around till we are too dizzy to see straight.
It's true. Life is hard.
You are not alone.
You're not alone in that everyone, at one time or another, feels the same. Some decisions are weightier and have greater ramifications than others, but it is all a matter of perspective. The pressing problem of today may be nothing compared to what I face tomorrow. And that may be nothing compared to the dilemma of my neighbor, my friend, my coworker.
We all, every one of us, enter those halls where every door of decision looks the same, and is as likely to lead us to the precipice of despair as it is to offer deliverance.
You also are not alone in that you do not have to make these choices in isolation. We have friends. We have family. We have the church and pastors, we have spouses and children, we even have professionals of all kinds available to us to provide insight and knowledge.
Yet even those, as great as they are, sadly fall short. All that support, while of some comfort, all too often doesn't provide us what we want, what we so desperately desire.
An answer.
The answer. The right choice. The perfect decision. The one response that would make everything right and good. For all their insight and experience, all of mankind cannot tell us what we should do. We have to make the choice.
In that, it seems, we are very much alone.
But we are not.
Neither father nor mother, sister nor brother, friends, spouses, consultants, advisers, doctors, lawyers, or even pastors or priests can tell us exactly what we should do in these toughest of times. They can help, but they cannot provide that one perfect answer, that one straight and clear path.
Only God can do that.
Oh yes, God knows. And, probably, we all know that. We say it often enough: Only God knows what I should do. We say it, and we might even believe it. But do we act on it? Do we really tap into that one perfect resource who really can answer all questions, make all paths straight, and provide light where there is only darkness?
The reality is, God wants to help. He's waiting to help. He's standing at the door awaiting our call. All we have to do is knock, and He will answer.
Proverbs 3:5-6 reads: Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight (NIV).
That's exactly what we're looking for, isn't it? I mean, isn't it! We want someone to show us the way, to give us a path that leads straight to the answer we need. A straight path--no curves, no hills or valleys, no side-trips or rabbit-trails. Just the straight up true and right answer.
That's what I'm looking for when life gets hard.
And God's willing to give it.
All we have to do is . . .
Trust God instead of ourselves. Trust Him and what He knows, not what we think we know. To trust Him to know the way, and then follow it. Submit. Even when the path He shows us looks completely wrong. Even if the door He points out is warped, misshapen, caked with cracked and peeling paint, and half-hidden by vines and weeds. Trust Him, and lean not on our own understanding.
It's easy to say. It's so hard to do. God's answers--because He is perfect in knowledge and understanding--sometimes just don't make sense to us. What it seems He is telling us all to often is not what we want, what we think we should do. It doesn't seem possible to follow that path, to open that door, and find the right way. It just doesn't make sense.
But it does. Because God is always right. Because God works all things for the good of those who love Him (Romans 8:28). Those who love Him, trust Him, and lean not on their own understanding.
We have to have child-like faith. And well we should, for indeed we are His children.
Life's full of tough choices.
Jobs. Relationships. Parents. Children. Even life and death, mortal and spiritual. Those long passages of life need not be walked alone. Those doors of decision need not be opened without guidance, without a comforting hand upon our shoulder. Truly, we need not even trod a single step in fear or trepidation.
For no decision is tougher, greater, or more fearsome than our Almighty God.
Trust Him, and lean not on your own understanding, and He will make your paths straight.
Amen.