New Paths

Last night my kids were gone and my house was quiet. I had a very long list of things to do. I wanted to write. I had bathrooms that desperately needed cleaning. But I really just needed to rest. Sometimes that can be hard to do. Our world says we need to be accomplishing something, checking things off our list, being "productive". There is always so much to do. All week I was going going going...and I just had to allow myself to rest last night.

So I watched a movie. I only had a few to choose from...and just decided on one just to decide. It isn't a movie that I would say was great and you should watch it. It really was just an average movie but I did laugh out loud a few times. What I am getting at is that I am not writing this to recommend it but the ending message made me think. And I just wanted to share briefly what that message is...(briefly because my bathrooms really need cleaning!).

The movie is called 500 days of Summer. In the movie there is a young man who works for a company that hires a young woman. The first time he sees her, he decides she is the one. And his mind is now completely set on the fact that she is it. From the beginning she lets him know that she doesn't believe in "love" but really "likes" him. They start dating. The movie is wrapped around their times together which are fun and romantic. Her name is Summer. Toward the end she breaks up with him and he is devastated. His life basically stops. He quits his job, he goes to the AM/PM in his robe to buy junk food...he believes life is over. Because of course she is "the one". The story goes on, they see each other again at an event. He thinks there is hope. But finds out she is engaged now. Anyway...after she gets married, the see each other at a park. She tells him that his belief in love was right it was just focused on the wrong thing. And that he needed to be open to seeing that there was other possibilities.

Okay...all of that for this...and maybe it doesn't really mean anything...but I think God wanted me to learn something out of this...because God doesn't waste our time! Sometimes we are very focused on what we want. We think we "need" or are suppose to do something. Maybe it is work, ministry, how to spend our day, a serving opportunity. And we expend a lot of energy in it. But after time, maybe even a lot of time invested in it, it ends. It doesn't work out. Something stands in our way. What ever it was is unavailable to us now. We are let go from a job. The job we thought we wanted and went to college for isn't really the job we are suppose to be at. Our life time goal is now being shifted. There are many things we get our minds so focused on that our only goal is to accomplish it.

But what if in the middle of it or even after working at it for a long time, God says to stop and change? What if our focus had been on the right thing at the time, but with the wrong motivation of the end result? Through this movie, this young man learned that he could love someone and that he really wanted to be an architect and not a greeting card writer. When he focused 500 days on one person...on one goal...on one purpose...and it came to an end that he didn't expect, he thought he had died. But really...new doors opened...but only when he was ready to allow them. New job. New love.

I think what God revealed to me, was that I get discouraged when something I think I have my mind set on going a certain way doesn't turn out...but if I would be open to see what God has in store for me because of a closed door...I would be able to see great possibilities. I would see the fruit He is trying to grow in my life. I would see the good out of the tough situations. I could see that a different path isn't the wrong path, but maybe the path God intended all along. I could see that each step I took on one path, gave me direction and wisdom for this new path.

"But forget all that---it is nothing compared to what I am going to do. for I am about to do something new. See, I have already begun! Do you not see it? I will make a pathway through the wilderness." Isaiah 43:18-19

I want to be focused on what God has for me and trust that if a door closes, even if it hurts, that through faith, God will show me where to go next.

I hope all of that made sense...Sometimes I wonder about myself!

Have a great day...I am off to clean the bathroom.

Love, Teresa