just a vapor.

July 19, 2012

I’m a control freak -- just ask my husband. If things don’t go like I planned, it stresses me out.

What’s so ridiculous about operating this way is that I really don’t have control over anything. Suuure, I can make plans and sometimes they will go precisely the way I envisioned. But most of the time, this is certainly not the case. Really, when it comes down to it -- I’m not guaranteed tomorrow, much less the next 5 minutes. So why do I waste so much time trying to make things go my way, rather than resting in God and His plans? Do I stubbornly live by my own agenda, or live life seeking the wisdom of God?

In my last post I wrote about some things I’ve learned the past few weeks in caring for a newborn and made the comparison that that’s how we should rely on God to take care of us. He should meet our every need. We should completely rely on and trust in Him to be in control. It’s a continual process.

So often we live our lives waiting for and anticipating the next thing … starting even as a young child. Eli is fascinated with being in Kinder. Ever since Silas started Kinder, he thinks being a Bunny or Shining Star is not good enough. In his mind, he will be happy when he is big enough to be in Kinder. Silas often asks me, “Mommy, how many more birthdays until I’m a grown up?” He has this illusion that being a grown up is so wonderful and perfect. It has to be the greatest thing ever being able to do whatever you want and to be BIG. This is not reality.

It seems like this never ending cycle - we can’t wait until Kinder, until high school, until college, until marriage, until kids, until a big promotion -- and then what? Will we somehow arrive? No!

“You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away.” James 4

I read this the other morning. Every time I come across this verse, it initially makes me sad probably because it makes me feel insignificant. When it comes down to it, I think everyone wants their life to mean something. We come out wanting attention … wanting to be important. Again, back to my kids. Last week at school, Silas had made a craft. It was a little noise maker and was pretty cool. I still needed to pick up Eli, so he followed close behind with his craft. He walked past a couple of people veeery slowly, demonstrating how it worked. He was not obvious saying, “Hey! Look at this! Look at me! Look at how cool this is!!” But I’m his mom, and I know just what he was doing. He wanted someone to say, “Hey! That’s awesome. Did YOU make that? That is SO cool!” I could see it in his face and could tell by how he was acting. He wanted someone to NOTICE him without having to say anything. Eli is a whole other story. He’ll just come up to you and say, “Hi, I’m Eli. I am four years old. {insert entire life story here}” Both are the same. They both seek to feel important, but just operate in two completely different ways.

We all do this. We post Facebook updates stating what we’re doing, where and with whom. We post what we’re eating, what kind of exercise we are doing, talk about what our kids say, do and how many times they pooped that day. Life doesn’t just happen anymore, we document it for the whole world. I Facebook, I Instagram, I blog … I am an open book. When I first got Facebook, I probably updated my status every hour. On Blogger, there’s a statistic page that tells how many people read my posts. I used to constantly hit refresh to see how many people read my blog that day. It’s like that somehow gave me value. Again, I think we want to feel like we matter - like our life counts for something. Maybe that’s also why we’re always seeking the next thing in life? Because that's the one thing that is surely going to make us happy. It's ironic though because you get to a point in your life where you kind of want to bottle it up - push pause so to speak. Like now, I wish I could freeze my kids just where they are and stay in this little bubble forever. But how silly! If I were capable of doing that, I guarantee I wouldn't have two of my amazing kids. I'd have frozen time when Silas was a baby and missed out on so much of what God had planned. Too often we either anticipate things to be a different way or want to hold on tight and not release control. We simply do not trust.

But nothing is ever going to make us happy. That’s the point. We were designed to have a relationship with God - that’s our purpose, that’s our meaning, that’s our value. C.S. Lewis said, “If I discover within myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world.”

“So short, unreal, and fading is human life, and all the prosperity or enjoyment that attends it; though bliss or woe for ever must be according to our conduct during this fleeting moment. We are always to depend on the will of God. Our times are not in our own hands, but at the disposal of God. All we design, and all we do, should be with submissive dependence on God.”

I am just a vapor. But all of my life, every breath, should be seeking Him. My dreams, my ambitions, my everything. And if I’m doing that, my desires will line up with His, because they’ll BE His. My contentment and my value will be IN Him.

DISCONTENT