Do You Want to Get Well?

Rather than trying to write God into our stories, we would be wiser to sit patiently with our Father and let him tell us his. ~ Redemption, Mike Wilkerson

I have a silly personality trait: I like to do math.  I like to figure out formulas on spreadsheets; I like to do calculations.  I used to play Yahtzee again and again just so I could figure out the average of my scores.  I like to play with numbers.  This silly trait of mine has helped in budgeting our family's money and writing a personalized debt-freedom plan.  When curve balls come our way, I actually like to sit down and figure out how to get us back on track.  But then I read the above quote and it's been poking at me ever since.  In fact, the other day, I was getting antsy, because I couldn't figure out how God was going to make it all work out; I couldn't make it make sense in my head.

On our way to church yesterday, we were talking about plans again and my husband said, "You can't figure out all of God's plans. Sometimes, you just have to have faith."  When we got to church, they were running through the end of the sermon and I heard Pastor Randy talk about getting a rhema--or personal--word from God.  So I figured the message was going to be great!  Perfect timing.  All I had to do was wait for the moment when God would speak to me.  I sat all through service and waited and didn't get "it."  At the end of service, when the emcee was bringing the service to a close, he told a brief story about a man who'd been crippled and had an encounter with Jesus (see John 5).  Jesus asked the man, "Do you want to get well?" (John 5:6)  To me, that seems like a pretty silly question, but the point is that we think--I think--we know how God's going to make it happen and the point to that story is that things are not going to be the way we can figure out, we must have faith.  I must have faith and "sit patiently with [my] Father and let him tell [me] his story."