Monday, September 29, 2008

Living Without Regret

“See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this world rather than on Christ.” Colossians 2:8 (New International Version)


Choices, choices, choices. They line the grocery store shelves, flash at us in commercials, and gleam on billboard signs along the road. Humans have always had to deal with choices, but they are multiplying at an incredible speed. I imagine a path in the forest. There have always been forks in the road, but we no longer see a single division in the path. More, as my friend described it, we see “a labyrinth of complexity.”

With each choice, there is the danger of regret. The “what if” haunts us down the path and we wonder as the path splits again if we should have taken the other way. Like a child who tries to read the “make your own choices” book in a hundred different ways to see the different endings, we try to keep all our doors open, not living life at all. We try to avoid regret by making all the “right” choices. I wonder if this is an example of falling into “hollow and deceptive philosophy” (Col 2:8). It makes sense, it sounds right, but to the Christian something doesn’t “feel” right.

I’m done with regret. Life is not a fork in the path, nor is it a labyrinth of complexity—all that is a mirage. It is a grand lie that our minds create when we think we are in charge. When we let the false lens fall away from our eyes, we see that there really is only one way to go. True regret only results when we don’t follow the One who can show us where to go. He may not use a path at all, but take us through the brush and over creeks to teach us what He wants us to learn.

To a Christian, this rings true. One path, one way. We know Who is the way, but we have not learned to follow Him. When we do learn, making a choice will be just another step following our Lord. The haunting questions of “what if” will not linger down the road because the road not taken is not the road for us.

Dear Lord, help me learn to follow you one step at a time. Make joy the spring in my step, faith the strength in my legs, and love the determination in my devotion to You. I love you.

Watchfulness and thankfulness

“Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful.” Colossians 4:2

Has something ever happened that you immediately know is from God? It seems out of the blue…like He just knew what you needed without you even telling Him. On the other hand, sometimes a thing will happen in my life, and I will shrug my shoulders and pocket the blessing without thinking about Who was behind it. When I swerve to avoid a car accident, I breathe a sigh of relief, thinking of the inevitability of statistics, being glad it wasn’t my turn to fill the insurance tables.

My prayers are as careless as my inventory of blessings. I pray, meaning it at the moment, and forgetting it the next. The answer comes, but I have not been watchful, and I think to myself, “Why wasn’t I just more patient? If I had known this was going to happen a week ago, I could have just waited without worrying.”

What I don’t take into account is that my prayers and the prayers of others are having an impact on those blessings. If I hadn’t prayed, would God have moved?

I wonder, how much glory has God received for those forgotten answers? My heart is sad for the multitude of loving gestures from my Father that have gone unthanked. How many thank you’s have been stolen away by my unrealized fatalism? Still more have been swiped by a subtle sense of entitlement to all that is good.

But regret is not where God wants us to live. Little children do not always thank their parents for a trip to McDonald’s, a Buzz Lightyear blanket or a “one more kiss” good-night. They expect it. Only with maturity do they grow to appreciate the many sleepless nights or ER runs endured by their parents with seemingly endless patience.

Up until now in my life, I have not been watchful, and as a result, not been as thankful to my God as I want to be in the future. I was at a point where I did not even see that I needed to be aware of the answers to prayer all around me. I am in a process. I am growing up. I will try again tomorrow, and reflect on my life in a new light.

God, thank you for your eternal provision. Thank you that you remember my prayers, even when I do not remember I mumbled them in the busyness of my life. Teach me to be watchful. Please know how grateful I am for the blessings that I see and especially for the ones I cannot.

Amen.