What Should I Do
With Interruptions?
In all this you greatly rejoice,
though now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of
trials. These have come so that the proven genuineness of your
faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by
fire—may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.? 1
Peter 1:6-7 (NIV)
There is no one
in this world who has lived a life without any interruptions. For some of you
reading this, you have experienced economic interruptions, or interruptions in
your academics. For some, your interruptions have come via illness or
depression. Whatever it may be, interruptions have a way of impacting life as
we know it. Life can go on smoothly for a whole and then all of sudden – things
go wrong, not just one thing, but several things at once.
Charlie Brown of
the cartoon fame once said, “It always looks darkest just before it gets
totally black!” Things don’t always go as planned. The truth is, no one sails
through life without interruptions. When interruptions come, it’s easy to gripe
and complain and blame. But I think there’s another way we can respond.
Henri Nouwen in
his book Reaching Out brings out this
observation. He writes these words which I think are full of wisdom and insight:
While visiting the University of Notre
Dame, where I (Nouwen) had been a teacher for a few years, I met an older
experienced professor who had spent most of his life there. And while we
strolled over the beautiful campus, he said with a certain melancholy in his
voice, “You know…my whole life I have been complaining that my work was
constantly interrupted, until I discovered
that my interruptions were my work.”
When I look at
my life I see that it is filled with interruptions, inconveniences,
frustrations and unexpected events. I usually handle these interruptions to my
life poorly. I react with frustrations and anger. Like a young child, I want to
stomp my feet and say, “It’s not fair!” I blame others for inconveniencing me.
But though these
interruptions are unexpected and catch us off guard, they do not catch God off
guard. They are not random meaningless events. In fact, these interruptions are
divinely placed in our path for a reason. God uses these interruptions to
change us to be more like Him.
Peter says when
trials and interruptions come, it is an occasion for us to reflect on how we
can trust god more in it and through it. God refines you. Why? So you can
become famous and everybody admires you. No! God uses interruptions and trouble
in your life to build authentic faith which God values more than your
possessions. It’s these moments where the rubber meets the road – where our
faith is stretched and we look down to see whether we are standing on rock or
sand.
Do we really
believe that God is in control of all the details of our life? These interruptions
are acts of God’s grace. They force us to work through these questions. They are
God’s way of taking off our blinders and making us see that we need the gospel
in every moment of the day.
These
interruptions remind us that we don’t have life figured out and that we can’t
do it on our own. They are like the Shepherd’s rod pulling us back from our
wandering ways, back to our Great Shepherd. These interruptions make us walk
away from doing God’s will. But even when God’s will be undone, we can respond
according to God’s will. That is why Jesus teaches us to pray, “Your will be
done..” But is it possible for us to pray this prayer when we are interrupted?
Thought provoking....thx
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