One of my friends said this to me today in a message on Facebook. It stuck with me and played around in my head for a while. Then while doing dishes, I said it out loud, "God wanted your journey to be set up this way for a reason...." and almost immediately I heard, "So he can see you go through it."
You see, I'm in the middle of a divorce that I don't want. I don't like even saying that because I believe God is restoring my marriage even if it's falling apart. The weird thing is my husband and I still live together with our four children. It's like we are roommates, not husband and wife, but in all other aspects we are a family. It's very hurtful to have him so close yet so very distant from me. And it's very difficult for me to just "give him to God". I never know how I'm supposed to act, what I'm supposed to say, how to interact with him, etc. Plus, his new found desire to wear cologne even though he has never worn any in the 11+ years we have been together is pretty disheartening to smell constantly.
My friend who said the above is going through the same thing, except her husband is out of the house now. She doesn't see him or speak to him unless he initiates contact. She is praying her way through this, and like mine, her marriage is being restored. It's happening. We might not see it, but God is working. We know it.
Her point in saying that to me was that for some reason God decided I needed to go through this in a different way that she is. And as I prayed over her words, it came to me that my husband needs to see the work God is doing in me.
Yet at the same time, I need to let God do the work in me without wanting and needing others to see it.
“Be careful not to practice your righteousness in front of others to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven.
“So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. --Matthew 6:1-4Conundrum! Really?! Could this be any harder?
Sure it can! God blessed me with a brain that never ever stops. I'm serious. It just goes. I have no control over it. So when it wanders, it worries, and when it worries, I over think everything.
As soon as I start going off on a tangent in my head, I pray to God to let that stop. Please Lord, this is torturing me enough. Please let me not torture myself on top of it all.
Where was I? Well, I guess...I just feel like I'm on this merry-go-round that won't stop. Or at least I can't figure out which direction I have to go to get off of it. I'm very confused. Constantly. I just have to trust that at any given moment God is going to send me a huge neon arrow sign indicating what I need to do. And then I will obey.
