A little background may help.
I was laid off from my job in October. I had worked there a little over 9 years. I was good at what I did and I was respected by my peers. So why was I laid off? Because God has a plan. Pure and simple. God knows the desires of our hearts and, as I am starting to see, sometimes those desires mean that there may be some changes needed in our lives. My desire was to be closer to our kids and the grandkids. Not a desire that involved making more money or buying more stuff. A very pure desire. Before working at the paper I worked at another paper for almost 11 years. Getting that job was a great answer to God but it came after we lost everything. We lost our home, our car, our pride and our selves. God needed us to get to that point before He could work. I finally let be God be God. I stopped taking charge of finding a job on my own strength and let God.
So after almost 20 years of having a secure position and making good money God has allowed that to be taken away. But He has given us in its place the opportunity to have the desire of our hearts and allow us to be closer to the kids. He has exceed that desire and made it so that we can be in the same town as one of our kids! Wow that was unexpected but God knows us, He knows what brings joy to our hearts and a smile to our face. I need to remember this. Remember that God gave us the desire of our hearts and more.
In a few weeks we will be leaving the place we have called home for over 26 years. Four of our kids were born here. All of them had the same kindergarten teacher. They learned to play soccer and baseball here. They went to AWANA and learned verses and won awards here. They made their own friends that are still friends today. We have been at the same Church for almost 26 years. We have seen our Church grow from 50 on a good Sunday morning to over 350. We have seen our pastors kids grow up. We have seen the kids in our youth group grow from little kids who needed us to keep them alive to adults who are married and have their own children. How crazy is that! Bittersweet.
But if I let God be God then I know that the future can only be exactly what God wants it to be. I am not worried about a "position". I am not worried about what others may think. Why not? Because I am going to let God be God. I am going to let Him show me the things in my life that I need to fix. I am going to allow God to make me a better husband, a better father and more importantly, a better man of God. Not going to be easy I know. I know that there may be some hard times or things to deal with but I know, I know, that God is God. I know that He never changes. I know that he sacrifices His ONLY SON for me. I wouldn't even consider it. He didn't even hesitate. He loves me that much. So why wouldn't He want the very best for me. Why wouldn't He want me to enjoy as much joy as I can.
Today I begin letting God be God. Today I am going to be a better follower of Christ.
