I like control; I admit it! I have a strong preference for things going according to the script that I lay out, minor variations are ok, but the flow needs to follow my carved trail. In my ideal world my work colleagues’ act as an integrated team, my adolescent kids enjoy growing up within a model of my design, and my wife anticipates and responds to my every wish. In reality things are exactly the opposite! People work in ways that makes sense and help them succeed in areas they believe are important, kids must and will discover their own identity in their own time, and my wife shares my view in reverse.
It is too easy to ignore the ways I put God into the same box. I naturally assume that God’s mercy is in response to my dilemmas. Clearly it is the state of the human condition that drives God’s compassion and behavior. When bad things happen and God does not respond and deal with them then I assume it is a decision that God made with a message intended for me. Sometimes I am very dense!
I continue to confront problems that I have no answers to. The fact that I know I am clueless does not reduce the stress. I struggle, I wonder, and I pause. Is this what all parents confront with the adolescents, especially when the importance of work and material things is very much up in the air? What about the need to pay bills, get ahead, and survive? Then there are the desires and dreams of younger days that will not go away. What do we do with them?
Is life pushing me along or pulling me in directions I do not know or understand?
The facts are there for us to understand. “God told Moses, ‘I’m in charge of mercy. I’m in charge of compassion.’ Compassion doesn’t originate in our bleeding hearts or moral sweat, but in God’s mercy.” (Romans 9.15,16) God is pulling us to himself, if we will let him. God’s in charge.
