Ever laid your heart before God and asked Him to give you His desire.... and when He did, you received it fully into your heart and pursued it, only for it to be thwarted in some way? Ugh… disappointment sucks!... no matter if it's a big thing or a small one.
This recently happened to me with a more minor situation, but it caused me to ask some big questions: Do you care, God? Why would you tell me to pursue something only for it not to happen? Did I miss you? Was my desire bad? Were you just teasing me?
Maybe it's none of those things…
Dwelling on those questions can send me into a death spiral so I needed to find a way out – and quick… because I was really down and the enemy was starting to lick his chops. I reached out to a sage voice in my life, and here's what I learned.
In every disappointment there is a seed of fulfillment.
Imagine this made up scenario…
You have a strong desire for strawberries. You pray about it and sense God telling you to drive to a certain place to get them. This is even confirmed!! So, you make the arrangements and drive a long distance (which requires sacrifice) to get there. Once there – no strawberries! Anywhere. What?!! The death spiral begins…
My sage had a different perspective:
You have to remember that God is your fulfillment. You have to trust Him with it. For Him to give you something better is who He is. For Him to bring fulfillment out of disappointment is who He is. It is also the miracle.
Maybe the disappointment is a character reveal. There were no strawberries there, but He provides blueberries a little further ahead. Will you eat the blueberries or throw them in His face?
My answer - "throw them in His face" because that's NOT what my desire was for (lol, sassy but honest)
Wise yoda continued…
You've gotta humble yourself and eat the blueberries. It could be that more magnificent strawberries are ahead and bushels of them. What about this?… A 16 year old wants a BMW. Her father buys an old beat up Buick. Will the teen drive the Buick or stubbornly reject it? The best choice is to drive the Buick. Character revealed. Is she willing to drive the Buick? The Buick is the path to getting the BMW – same as blueberries are the path to an even larger harvest of strawberries.
• You have to trust God with your disappointment – give it to Him and allow Him to give you something in return for it. It's a choice of surrender, like this… "God, I didn't get what I wanted, but you are my fulfillment. You will fulfill me. That is your character, and I choose to trust in it."
• Sometimes when you desire something and get disappointed about it, it means it's not ready. He has something better for you in the future.
• Bottom Line: God has something better for you ahead. You have to trust Him by taking the fulfillment He's giving you in the present (i.e. by taking the blueberries), even though it's not what you asked for. THIS is planting the seed. In every disappointment, there is a seed of fulfillment.
Moral of the Story… Eat the blueberries and drive the Buick!