How is God developing your character?

“We have to learn to trust God!” Her tone was emphatic as she challenged me to stop the worry-talk and trust God. My Mother at 82 has served Jesus since her birth! Her life-story is filled with incredible challenges, heartache and strange twists and turns yet the not-destroyable rope weaved throughout her story is her faith - simple, uncomplicated, and child-like.

Through the years, I have often sought her counsel. She has her strong opinions of what should and should not be done, but the bottom line is always the same: “We have to learn to trust God!”

Learning to trust God is a two-way street. Through life, we are learning to trust God but He is also testing us to see if we are able to let go and trust Him, not just half-heartedly but totally and fully!

My worry-points have been many and varied –from the ridiculous to genuine and real concerns. I’ve worried if a parking ticket mailed in at the post office would get lost in the mail and I would be doubly fine or worse yet, get arrested! I’ve walked miles working through stress-filled-worry kind of praying trying to build up my faith and believe that my house would sell in a season when the buyers were scarce and we were strapped into a short selling time. When I found myself in a Montreal hospital in a life-threatening tubal pregnancy and facing immediate surgery, I worried.

It’s only as I’ve looked back on my faith-growing journey that I clearly see, I worried far too much. “Learning to trust God” has been a long process and the one “its-taken-forever to-learn” lesson that has developed my character the most.

One of my Bible heroes is the little boy who gave Jesus his lunch. Five thousand men plus women and children gather to hear Jesus. It’s lunch time – a panic moment – because there is no place to buy the amount of bread they need and it would cost a small fortune to feed such a crowd – money they did not have. Philip is stressed, Andrew gets silly and points to a little boy with a lunch that would at best nourish 3 normal-sized appetites. Jesus takes over.

He asks everyone to sit down, takes the small five barley loaves and two fishes and holds up the problem and resources on hand, to His Father and prays. What a glorious day to witness God at work and see more and more lunch appear to feed every last man, woman and child and then have an astonishing 12 baskets of left-over’s picked up for the community food bank!

How is God developing my character? He is teaching me that worry must not be part of my agenda. I must hold up the problem and the resources I have and give them to Jesus and allow Him to take over and do His work. The result is always astonishing even when I have to wait for it. “Trust in the Lord with all you heart; do not depend on your own understanding. Seek his will in all you do, and he will direct your paths.” Prov. 3:5

How is God developing your character?

Your friend,
Margaret

What are 2 of your best personality qualities?

I find it interesting in my coaching practice that if I ask a client to list their flaws or things they don’t like about themselves, they can rhyme off a list without delay. However, when I ask them to list their strengths or what they DO like about themselves, there is often hesitation (or a very short list!). I am saddened by the fact that we often associate identifying our strengths with conceit or bragging. And so I’d like to point out that knowing you are a good cook is no different than knowing you have brown eyes – it’s just a fact. What makes it bragging is when we “compare” with others and consider ourselves better than someone else. (OK…I’ll get down off my soapbox now :) )

Back to the question at hand…what are two of my best personal qualities?
What pops up for me right now is determination and creativity. From a young age I learned that if I really wanted something (not in a material sense) and I stuck with it and tried different approaches, I could figure out a way to make it happen. I still think like that today. “Where there’s a will, there’s a way!” Likely, this is where my creativity comes into play. Solutions to challenges are rarely “in the box” but instead often require looking at things in new and different ways.

My challenge today? Getting as many of you as possible to share YOUR best qualities right here on this blog.



My solution? Hmmmm…any ideas?