The Answer Is Blowing In the Wind

My wife Jan and I are about to embark on a college visit.  It’s not really a visit as much as a revisit.  It’s a revisit to the place she graduated from just “a few” years ago and to say she’s excited to go back is a bit of an understatement.

I am very happy to accommodate this as well, not just because I’m her hunk of a husband (it’s ok to laugh here!) but because I am fortunate she left college without some loser boyfriend and eventually met me!

The story went something like this; on one of Jan’s first days on campus it was announced that students should “look to their left and look to their right, because their future mate may be in sight.”  Talk about pressure!  And in reality many of her classmates are happily married to people they met in college.  The same thing can happen at any college because you have a lot of young people that want to answer that big question in life.

But Jan was a relationship Houdini and managed to graduate with a degree and without a ring.  Lucky me! 

Not long after she graduated Jan made a list.  She made it through 4 years of college and didn’t meet “the one” so she set to making a list of characteristics and hopes in a future husband.  She wrote it all down and then tucked it away in her bible.  When you have a desire, a hope, and dreams that’s a great place to store them while the answer develops.

Two years later we not only met, but spent nearly every day getting to know each other and it was decided that this was for real;  we were meant to be together forever!

Jan had her list and I managed to save up some money from bike racing to buy a ring.  I even made her ride her bike up a mountain in order to get to the proposal and ring.  All was set and we were excited.

The evening before our wedding Jan was driving to the rehearsal dinner.  Her mind was racing with everything about to happen but sitting on passenger seat was her bible, and in that was the list that she created and then handed over years before.  Without much thought she put the passenger side window and down and the vacuum-effect of the wind open her bible and sucked all the papers, her husband-list and all, out the window and off into the countryside. 

Have you looked for answers to life’s questions?  Jan did.  I do, and still have a lot of unanswered questions!  Did you ever think that the order in which we pursue an answer is as important as the actual answer?

Jan had a question and it was eventually answered, not just with me nervously handing her a ring, but by God’s mighty wind taking away her list forever but leaving me for her, forever!   But she didn’t start the hunt for a husband by hanging out at a bar or signing up for some service.  Or settling for someone that happened to be at the same college at the same time.  Nope, she wrote down what she wanted and gave it to God.

Boy, I tend to get ahead of myself sometimes when I want a question answered.  I think the cliché is “get ahead of my skis”…where I start the process of getting an answer, making an answer, or demanding an answer long before its time.  I get ahead of the process and God’s timing.  Jan wrote down who she wanted to be with before she could see me; I suppose it’s best to write down our questions, concerns, hopes, and dreams and then give them to God before we can see the outcome as well!

So the order matters.  We can get ahead of ourselves and look everywhere for an answer.  Or we can drop it at the foot of the cross, where God has our best in mind, His timing in mind, and a healthy relationship with Him in mind!  If we start there we will have a peace that can’t be duplicated by any worldly advice and an outcome that is unique to you.

It doesn’t mean all of the answers are exactly what you want, when you want them.  That’s not the reality of life here on earth.  But our hope is built through perseverance, and when God has our heart than He can certainly provide answers that are meant to draw you to Him and grow your faith.

It’s ok to look to your left, and your right, for answers.  But I’d suggest writing your questions out and laying them down first!