I Just Want To Know What Is Next

Sometimes I get frustrated that God doesn't take the time to tell me what is coming next in life.

I would like to know if I am walking into a season of good things, a season of hard work, or a season of rest.

I would also like to know what my future looks like. Do each of my kids grow up to be Doctors? Do I travel the world? Do I achieve all the dreams I have stirring in my heart? Do Treasa and I retire in a beautiful home on the ocean, living out the end of our life, spoiling grandkids and great grandkids, celebrating all God has done?

If I am honest, I really hate not knowing what happens. It stresses me out.

Treasa doesn't like watching suspenseful movies with me because I have to fast forward during intense scenes in order to see how it works out. Then I rewind back to where it was, and watch with peace, knowing how it ends.

For the record, because I love my wife, sometimes I just go to the spoiler websites and research how it plays out so she doesn't have to endure the constant starting and stopping of the movie.

I want to know what is coming. I don't expect it to be perfect or easy, but I want to know what is next.

So again, back to my frustration with God's refusal to reveal my entire future to me...

There have been a few times in my life, where God has pulled back the curtain of my future and allowed me to see a glimpse of what is to come. He shows me a picture, through a dream, through time in prayer, or during worship. A picture of some moment, some event somewhere in my days and years to come.

You would think that my response would be gratitude and appreciation for His answering my prayer; however, my response looks a lot more like panic than thanksgiving.

When God reveals even the smallest of pictures of what is ahead of me, I panic and begin to worry.

"How am I supposed to get from where I am to there God?" "How could I be a part of something like that?"

Truth is, my future is too much for me to handle. It is impossible for me to understand, or grasp.

If you are like me, and want to know what's coming, I completely understand how you feel.

Let me offer you a perspective that has helped me.

The things God wants to do in your life down the road, are more than you can handle today. The work God wants to accomplish through you, is more difficult than what you could accomplish today. The way God wants to use your gifts and talents ten or twenty years from now is a stretch for you to believe today.

Take heart my friend, you don't need to be ready today. You will be ready when that season comes.

I am working at living with this new perspective.

I may not know what my future holds, and all that God will place before me; but He knows.

I may not know how to prepare myself for the seasons that I will walk through years from now, but God knows exactly what I will need.

So instead of worrying about what is coming, I am choosing to stay focused on what is in front of me today.

I believe with all of my heart, that if I put my hands to the work in front of me, if I give my best effort today, and if I pour my heart into the people around me today, I will be ready for tomorrow.

If I trust God with my today, and live faithfully with the tasks before me today, God will work through those tasks to prepare me for tomorrow.

If I stack enough todays together, I will have all the preparation and experience for that someday I have been worried about.

In Matthew 25:14-30 we find a story that Jesus told to teach a few principles.

In the story, there is a rich man who goes on a journey, and leaves some money behind with three of his employees. To one he gives five bags of talents, to one he gives two bags, and to the third he gives one bag.

When the rich man is gone, the first two men, the ones with five and two bags, went and invested the money wisely. They both doubled what they had.

When the rich man returned he was pleased with both of them, and gave each of them even more.

The third man however, did nothing with his bag, he simply buried it and waited for the rich mans return.

The rich man told the man with one bag, that he was wicked and lazy. He then took the one bag he had been given, and gave it to the man who had doubled the five bags.

It is a great story, you should go read it.

Like the men in this story, we have a choice. We can do something with what is in front of us, we can do something with what we have been given. Or we can become paralyzed with fear, not knowing what to do, or what will happen, and simply bury our talents, bury what we have been given.

Like me, you have to accept that you will never know all that life will bring. That's okay, if we did know it would just stress us out anyway.

So let's pour into what is in front of us today. Let's give all our all to the tasks in front of us today, offering the talents we have now, and trust that God will prepare us for tomorrow.