Scrapbooks

"We all have the pictures of our lives in our minds, how they "should be," how we hope they will be -- how we picture them.  We plan it all out:

• when we will be married
• how many kids we will have
• where we will live
• how much money we will make
• what our jobs will be
• what our houses will look like
• how our husbands will treat us
• who our friends will be
• how our kids will behave
• how close our grandkids should live
• when we will retire
• what our ministries will be like

At some point we realize it doesn't work that way.  We can't control the actual scrapbooks -- the ones reflecting the past rather than the future.  But we still long to try to control our lives and to build them to match the pictures of the lives we want.

And letting go?  The idea that we would actually hand it all over to God and say, "Go.  Build it.  Do whatever you want with all I have"...it is terrifying.

What if God planned any of these as part of the story?

• singleness
• struggle
• adoption
• a difficult husband
• infertility
• moving from the town we love
• an apartment instead of a house
• cancer
• disapproval
• death
• dangerous overseas missions
• financial hardship

What if he lets me suffer?  What if he asks me to sacrifice?  What if none of my dreams come true? 

The very thought of doing anything demands everything. 

 We have to face our fears.  If we believe he is real, if we believe he has an eternal heart, we have to face the fact that a God like that may mess with our temporary comfort and fictional scrapbooks."

-- from the book Anything by Jennie Allen