Unanswered Prayers

Young Man used to have that stupid fish that hung on the wall and sang “Don’t worry, be happy” when someone walked by.  Drove me crazy!

Maybe because that is just an extremely irritating song.  Or maybe because I was spending a lot of time worrying about things and was tense and on edge, and the fish was reminding me I shouldn’t do that.  

Really, stupid fish?  You think you know what it takes to manage my life and family?  Aren’t you just the arrogant little so-and-so.  If I don’t worry about the bills...the kids...the corn prices...the weather...my job, then who would?!

Along with the worrying, I prayed, because that’s what we Christians do.  Dear God, do this.  Give me that.  Make this other thing happen.  And then I would go back to worrying because this, that, and the other thing didn’t happen.

Then came a time when we were looking to buy our own acreage.  What we really, really, really wanted was to buy the home farm, but that seemed unrealistic, so we were exploring other options.  

One option was a piece of real estate that was being auctioned.  We had the financing lined up, we had a realtor involved to keep us in line, and we were prepared to purchase this building site.

It didn’t happen.  

Complete devastation.  Much tears and wailing.  

Now what?  Back to worrying and praying for what I wanted.  

Know what?  In the end, we ended up being able to buy the home farm just like we wanted.  It took a lot of sweat, blood, and tears...and some Divine Intervention.  

Now, every time I drive past the property that we lost out on at the auction, I praise God for having the best plan despite all my instructions otherwise.  

It made me realize I had approached the prayer thing all wrong.  I was going about it thinking, Dear God, MY will be done instead of the correct attitude of Dear God, THY will be done.

It was at that point that my prayer habit changed, and I realized I needed to pray for peace, strength, and/or comfort while I put the problem--whatever it might be--in God’s hands because He is so much smarter than I am and knows what will be best for my life.

Someone once asked me how I managed to maintain an “even keel” attitude when facing challenges.  The short answer is that you have to have a whole bunch of big, bad crap happen to realize that most of life’s obstacles are small stuff and not worth getting bent out of shape about because God will work it out.  All the worry I may or may not do wouldn’t change a thing, so why waste the energy?

I’m not saying that life doesn’t require some work and effort along with the prayers.  Far from it.  I’m saying we need to let God orchestrate His plan while living our lives as best we can.

I still have my moments when I get stressed because--hey--I’m human.  But by and large, I don’t lose sleep anymore.  

Hey, stupid fish, I am happy!