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My week began in a house with five other
women — three complete strangers and two I’d met briefly months before.
Five were writers and one an avid reader. We’d all left our “regular lives”
to hide away for a week.
The activities were simple. Read and
write. Read and write. Read and write some more. But the way we
accomplished those goals were as different as the lives we’d left behind.
Psalm 103:7 says, “[God] made known his
ways to Moses, his deeds to the people of Israel.” I don’t
remember how long ago I realized the term “ways” was different than
“deeds,” but I do know my week of writing with five strangers was a
beautiful example of this concept that still shapes my work, my home and my
understanding of God and His Word.
Though my soon-to-be friends and I spent
seven days in identical activity (deeds), our form and processes (ways)
were vastly different. One gal wrote alone in her room each day; another
sat at the kitchen table amid noise and activity. I wrote in the basement,
morning and afternoon, but my brain turned to mush by 5 p.m. Another new
friend slept late and didn’t start writing until the rest of us went to
bed. Our activity (writing) was the same, but our methods were as unique as
the sunsets we watched together each evening.
My daughters had introduced the ways vs.
deeds concept to me years earlier. Even as a pre-teen, our eldest focused
on completing a goal. Sweep the floor. Wash the dishes. Make your bed.
Set the table. Get it done, and get on with life. She had people to
see, movies to watch and sports to play.
But for our youngest, life has always been
about the journey. How does that vacuum work? Look at those bubbles in
the dishwater! I think I’ll try a new pillow arrangement on my bed. Why
must the forks go left of the plate? On my best parenting days, I tried
to avoid imposing my ways on their deeds and offered space
for individuality within the spectrum of my experience.
More recently, while waiting in an
especially slow grocery line, I assessed the ways and deeds of the
clerk. Impatience reared its ugly head. My next thought couldn’t have been
my own: What if I pried my fingers off other people’s ways and gave
grace (unearned kindness) for them to do it differently? For my spouse,
children, aging parents, church leaders, bosses and co-workers — could I
“let” them do a project or activity without “suggesting” my way?
Then that little voice inside my mind grew
extremely uncomfortable. Could I “let” God do as He wished without
imposing my way? Why was that so uncomfortable? Let me share just one
example.
My grandma had suffered for weeks in the
final stages of stomach cancer. I’d been shaking my fist at the sky, asking
God why had He not taken her quickly. Not long after, I got a call saying
my grandma had regained consciousness 30 minutes before she died, and she’d
led her favorite nurse to faith in Jesus. In that moment, I realized an
important lesson.
God sees with a telescope, and I look only
through a microscope.
He revealed His ways to me that night. I
don’t believe my Heavenly Father gave my grandma cancer or that He wanted
her to suffer. But I know God redeems even the worst things in this world
for eternal value. I can trust in His goodness, His wisdom and His love.
His ways are always best — even when my microscope can’t see them.
Dear Lord, please reveal to me Your ways
as I become more aware of Your deeds. Help me trust Your goodness when I
don’t understand Your holiness. Thank You for being a God I can know. In
Jesus’ Name, Amen.
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