Hey all. It feels like it has been forever since we sat down for a little chat. Isn’t it funny how that happens? You plan to make that phone call or send that quick text but busyness gets in the way and before you know it, eons (it seems) have passed by and you still haven’t connected. I don’t know what it’s been like for the rest of you in the spirit of that busyness lately but for us? For us life has been absurdly relentless.

Most know from previous posts that we have been preparing for our son, our “baby”, to leave the nest and head off to college.

(Let me just pause here for a moment….if you have never prepared for life after high school and college with a child I can assure you, it is one of the most stressful things you can do. Especially made more stressful if said child will be a college athlete. Even if we didn’t have everything else going on in our lives, we’d still be on the razor’s edge in making sure all the loose ends are squared away for him.)

Anyway.

Adding to all the college stress, it would appear as though the dominoes of life are falling. It has just been one thing right after another, turning life into a great big soup sandwich. Each domino, as it crashes into the next, reverberates and echoes circumstantial consequences in ways I don’t even think I fully understand yet…and maybe that’s the part about all this I’m finding so stressful. It isn’t the actual event; it’s the ripple effect post event, the moments where we strive to pick up pieces and move forward to easier, calmer and better.

The most recent event in our lives has been the slow death of the transmission in our son’s truck (which by the way is riding in on the coat tails of a few other major financial blows that left field decided we needed). This is the truck that in 2 weeks we are supposed to pack his stuff into and use to move him onto campus 8 hours away. The same truck that is not yet paid for. The very same truck that we have covered in prayer to get him through these next 5 years of college.

I told my husband, when we realized what was happening, that I just don’t get it. You try and you try and things just steadily decline and get worse. The toe high mass at your feet changes to a grassy knoll, shifting into a rocky mound which then transforms into a steep hill, finally settling itself into a mountain whose ridge is so high it’s peak remains hidden.

These are the ripples that grow.

The moment the words escaped my lips, as I hung up the phone and proceeded to the check out line at Walmart, I heard a small whisper: “Don’t you trust me anymore?” and if I’m honest, the answer may sometimes be “I don’t know”.

I don’t know, God, if I trust you to take care of this the way I want you too. I don’t know, God, if I trust you enough to not let things get any worse than they are. I don’t know, God, if I trust you to tie this up in a bow for me without any other interference. That’s the true answer. If we’re honest.

It’s simple, when things seem perfect, to trust completely. It’s easy to trust when things get a little rocky but firm ground can still be felt. It remains possible to trust when the world starts wavering and your “comfortable” becomes unsteady. It takes a little bit of faith to trust when the heat rises and unsteady turns into a fall. It calls into question every ounce of your faith to be able to trust when the fall turns into an overboard in the middle of an ocean with no bottom or land to be found.

But at no point can I honestly say that it’s impossible to trust.

As the question reverberated through my mind, I began to picture a stone cast into water and the rhythm of the small circular waves resulting from it. As my mind played through this mini movie, I started to wonder if maybe I was focusing too hard on only the crest of the ripple, ignoring the rest in between each one.

I’ve always seen the hills and valleys of life a little differently than most. While the top of the hill (the crest of the ripple) may equate to overcoming a battle or rising to the top in victory, that doesn’t necessarily leave the valley (the space between ripples) relegated to a position of defeat or being inferior. On the contrary, I sometimes see the valleys as moments of rest before the next climb. The peak might mean you’ve found victory but it’s still a workout coming back down off that mountain….and sometimes it’s a quick and painful slide. The valley though is level ground and far too often we (or at least I do) take the simplicity of it for granted.

In our ripples, in the small waves that that have flowed out from the fall of each domino, there have been moments of rest in between. Sometimes, that rest is only for a day. Sometimes it’s a week. But if I choose to see it, rest is always there. In the valley, while catching my breath, before the next climb.

“Do you trust me?” “I dont know, Lord. Maybe”

And with that maybe, I maybe have just found my problem. Looking back over life, I can’t see a single moment when God hasn’t taken my maybe’s or my I don’t know’s and proven that they should have been yes’s. Every. Single. Time. Whether ripples, waves or mountains, he has consistently, faithfully, fully held my head above water and strengthened my legs to carry me on.

I know it is normal for us all to find ourselves in a place of maybe from time to time. It makes it no less heartbreaking though to realize that as faithful as He has been, your treacherous heart deceives you into forgetting.

Almost as if it’s a cycle isn’t it? We keep dropping rocks, knocking over dominoes and causing chaos fumbling our way through life while God comes behind us, cleaning up our messes with as little hurt as possible all the while only hearing maybe in our conversations with him and watching us forget the way His hand moves in our lives.

My next thought as this new pattern of ivories take shape is that “I don’t know” comes from faith in myself, “maybe” comes from faith in myself first and then in Him and it’s only when my faith, my trust, is in him alone that that my “maybe” can be a “yes”.

As my thoughts march across my mind with “look at me” signs held high, I see glimpses through the picket line of what my flesh is trying to hide. If my first thought when trying to breathe from this new blow wasn’t to ask for Heavenly help, then my faith is no longer in my savior alone.

Sometimes, it isn’t a lesson in the turmoil that has to be learned. It’s more a drawing from the overwhelming that life becomes. A call to remain, to lean, to trust.

And for a moment, the final set of ripples form.

It took about 25 minutes, standing in the checkout line for my thoughts to ramble and meander themselves in order so that I could process this newest dilemma. As I began to walk out of the store, my own words were given back to me, “you try and you try and you try”. As I heard them, I finally heard the truth. I’VE tried. On my own, all alone, only allowing His assistance and help….and I have no idea how long it’s been going on.

It would seem as if my stress isn’t from the circumstance or from the consequences of those circumstances. My stress is from standing on my own and forgetting that my way is not best. What a slow deceitful fade it has been to end up at that realization.

“Do you trust me?” “I’m gonna try, God. I’m gonna try”, because truth be told, that’s all He ever wanted from me. Or from you.

With my try in hand, I’m going to lay my worries aside. The burden has become too heavy and I’ve had the glorious experience of His light yoke so many times in the past that I refuse to keep carrying this load. It will be whatever He intends for it to be and I need to be ok with that because he has never failed me yet.

So as you go about your day today, watching the ripples as your stones are cast, make sure you focus on the right part. You can catch your breath at the tops of the mountains, sure, but take advantage of and use those valleys to find rest. Try to trust….even if all you have is maybe or I dont know and just leave the rest up to Him.

Thanks for sitting down with me today and reading the ramblings of my overworked mind. I enjoy our visits more than you know and I’m going to try to be a little more regular about them.

We’ll just have to see how the dominoes fall.