It's a Set Up
Growing up, I think we all get this concept in our head that there is no purpose is our failures and disappointments. We see those who get 'first place' and think that all they have ever done is succeed.
It's hard to envision life on the other side of defeat. It's hard to keep dreaming when your vision is cracked.
We think that eventually, the more experience we have, the less we will fail. The less we will be disappointed or let down by people.
The world gives us many reasons for our failures: our expectations, our weaknesses or the wrong decisions we've made.
Alongside those we are told to make sure we work really hard, put ourselves first and make connections with all the 'right' people.
Yet that is not how God designed it. It was never about doing all the 'right' things or being all the 'right' things. He has chosen to use us DESPITE all of our shortcomings.
‘He chose us [actually picked us out for Himself as His own] in Christ before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy (consecrated and set apart for Him) and blameless in His sight, even above reproach, before Him in love.’
Ephesians 1:4
So why do we still keep looking to people to validate and elevate us? Why do we keep performing and pitching our worth - when the best advocate is right here with and for us?
I have seen so many people put their hopes in people and positions rather than God and they are constantly left unsatisfied.
The difference is that when God speaks, no word returns void. He doesn't ever fall back on his word, he's not thinking of his own gain or glory - he wants what is best for you!
When I look back on the disappointments I've had, not only did they grow me but they challenged me to re-evaluate what or who I let influence me.
Was it my own dreams? Was it that position or a person's opinion? Or was it God's word?
If only we started viewing our disappointments as the perfect opportunity for God to show up, to set us up for even better!
What if stopped letting our failure define us and let God renew and refine us? What if God didn't put us on the platform because he could use us better in among the crowd?
If you're anything like me we can get in the habit of telling God where we could be best used and then getting angry when he doesn't put us there!
Where you are may be small and insignificant in your eyes but there is a reason you've been placed there.
Maybe God wants you to humble yourself and start making the best of the situation?
Maybe if you stopped feeling sorry for yourself, you would actually start to see the possibilities and opportunities just waiting for you to grab hold of!
Maybe instead of waiting for someone else to give you permission or a position to use your gifts, you need to just start believing in the abilities God has given you!
God wants to use these disappointments to set you up for your destiny but that requires us to let go of what we see in the natural and trust him.
We need to make a choice to continue on the path, even when along the way the promises of God aren’t packaged in the way we expect.
We need to make a choice to trust the giftings God has given us, even when the world denies us.
Maybe God wanted to show you and the world, that even when everything doesn't seem to favor you, if God has chosen you than nothing can stop what he wants to do in and through you.
Maybe, just maybe this journey was all just a set up for your beautiful testimony and God's greater glory.
‘Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God!
How unsearchable his judgments,
and his paths beyond tracing out!
“Who has known the mind of the Lord?
Or who has been his counselor?”
“Who has ever given to God,
that God should repay them?”
For from him and through him and for him are all things.
To him be the glory forever! Amen.’Romans 11:33-36
