Don't Forget to Remember

Have you ever felt like you were trapped in the movie Groundhog Day?

I have been living in what feels like a never-ending season of uncertainty.

It all started eight years ago. My divorce was in process, and I was wondering what the next steps were for my boys and me. A life I never thought I would be living was now my reality as a single mom, and I was in complete charge. Decisions needed to be made, and I was the only one to make them. Mind you, I was still in shock that this was my actual life. I was just waiting for someone to come and shake me awake.

Nothing could have prepared me to be where I was, yet there I was. I went so long feeling out of control in my marriage, and all of a sudden, I had all of the control. It was overwhelming, terrifying, and paralyzing. I had no idea what to do. I prayed, cried, waited, and questioned, only to hear silence for months. The one piece of instruction I knew God gave me at the very beginning of my divorce process was to be still and wait, but when your world has fallen apart, and it feels like you are being crushed with all the uncertainties, how does one not feel the panic to figure out what’s next? For months, I tried to follow God’s instruction as best as I could, but over time, it started to feel irresponsible of me to just “wait,” especially when I didn’t even know what I was waiting for.

The silence from God was so unsettling, and my desire to be settled just couldn’t handle it. I didn’t want to wait any longer. After my divorce was finalized, my impatience took over, and I started the process to buy a house on 10 acres in a tiny country town that didn’t even have a grocery store, ha.

One afternoon, as I was about to move forward with the appraisal, God broke His silence. I was sitting on my parents' screened-in front porch, had just hung up the phone with my realtor, and was reading a Charles Spurgeon devotional when God asked, “Did I tell you to go forward?”

I answered Him by saying that He didn’t tell me to go forward, but He didn’t tell me NOT to either, and that I was just trying to figure out life.

He then told me I would get a job offer, and that would be how I would know where I needed to go. So I immediately made all the calls, cancelled the house, and waited…again. I didn’t tell anyone anything other than I didn’t feel ready to move forward with getting that house. Three months later, my pastor from the church that my now ex-husband and I used to attend and lead worship was messaging me with a job offer. Mind you, this was 5 hours from where I was living with my parents, but I took the job, and my boys and I moved 2 months later.

As I remember this time in my life, parts of it are so encouraging, but then it also seems really close to how I feel today.

Yes, eight years later, I am in that same place of question and waiting, and if I am being really honest, I can’t remember not feeling this way. Even after getting the job offer, which gave me a huge answer, my head was still filled with questions.

Why? Why am I moving away from my family and friends? Why did I have to move back and work for the church that my ex-husband and I used to attend together? Wasn’t there a job I could have taken closer to my family?

And today, having left that job and starting my own business, I still have so many questions.

Will the questions ever stop? When will I ever have peace and not feel the need to know everything? When will I just feel confident in my life? I always say it’s not God that I don’t trust, it’s me. Am I making the right decisions? Choices? Am I screwing things up because I am making things up? When I say it’s not Him I doubt, it’s me, is that even the truth?

I don’t want to be like the Israelites wandering because of their wondering, and I am trying my best to walk beside the still waters and enjoy the stillness instead of, well, questioning it. But I feel I have been waiting on something for so long and I still have no idea what "it" is.

Can you relate to any of this???

I’m so sorry if you can, but I also hope that you can feel strangely comforted by it. Sometimes just knowing we are not alone brings all the peace we need to keep going because, after all, what else is there to do? Give up? And then what? 

Ugh, more questions!

Annnd, this is the time when I have to tell myself to stop questioning and start remembering. There was a time when I was right in the middle of my divorce being finalized, and I was lying on my parents’ sofa about to go to sleep for the night.  Worry, anxiety, and fear filled my mind, and I remember saying to all the questions that swarmed my mind, “I don’t know, but I know Who does know, and that is all I need to know.” Even to this day, I can calm the brain storm with that simple truth that I don’t know what’s next, but God does.

So what’s your story? Where did you come from? What has God brought you through?

Whether you want to believe it or not, God has been with you every step, and that’s the beautiful part of remembering. I know some people say it’s best to look ahead and not look back, and I get it if you are trying to go back. After all, that is why the Israelites ended up wandering for so long. They remembered their past and wanted to go back to it. That’s right, they wanted to go back to slavery! How crazy does that sound? But if we are not careful, we could find ourselves in that same place. There is nothing in me that wants to go back to living the life I was and that is exactly why I want to remember where God has brought me from, so that I don’t fall into those same patterns or lifestyle.

I want to remember and learn, not return.

So when my brain gets crowded with questions about my future, I find peace in remembering my past and being thankful because, I may not be where I want to be, but thank God I am not where I was. He was faithful to lead me through then, and I know He will do it again. Of this I can be certain.