I just got off the phone with a friend of mine. The conversation did not end because we said our goodbyes but because she hung up on me. I’ve heard it said that you should not approach a sore subject when you’re still mad at someone but then I read somewhere in the Bible once where it said not to let t he sun go down while you’re still angry with someone. I guess I’m compromising and writing about it. I also went to Fred’s and bought an M & M ice cream cookie sandwich and a Coke which made the situation much more palatable.
The conversation with my friend took a turn for the worse when I began to try to fix her problems rather than listening to her vent about them to me. This is one of those issues that I plan to ask God about when I meet him face to face one day. This whole idea of men and women being wired so differently has produced a great amount of anxiety in my life and I’m only 27.
I’m a guy. We fix things. I think about an old episode of the Cosby Show where Cliff finds out that something in the house is broken and goes to get his tool belt to fix the problem. The whole family goes into crisis mode and begs Cliff to call a repairman because they know that he always makes things worse when he tries to fix something. He isn’t as handy as he thinks he is.
To know that there’s a problem and to force oneself to sit and listen to it without offering some input is painful at times. Sometimes in counseling sessions I sit and do the stereotypical counselor things such as offering empathetic grunts and reflective phrases. Sometimes I do it to show I’m intently listening to the person. Other times I’m just sleepy and I do it because it keeps me awake. Still at other times the person needs to talk so I try to keep my advice to myself. To listen, wait, and not act is excruciating sometimes. Sometimes, though, it seems that that is the very thing that is the most beneficial.
My conversation with my friend made me think of how God must look at me sometimes. I was trying to gain some wisdom about a relationship situation recently and decided on the novel idea of seeing what scripture said about it. Scripture threw out an obvious “Wait” sign. Unfortunately, that was not the wisdom I was looking for. I was certain that waiting could not be the best thing to do. I’m a guy. We fix things. We don’t wait around. I began to look for ways in which I might influence the situation; to twist and weave my life in with others’ so as to help God come to the goal that I was certain that He and I both knew was best.
Sometimes I think about God and what He must think of me. I’m certain that He loves me. I’m also certain that he has those days when He just looks down at me scratching and shaking his head asking Himself, “What in the world is he doing now?”
My plan rarely works out the way I plan for it to. In fact, when I keep my mouth shut, listen to God, and wait on Him, His ideas turn out to be far better in the end. So I sit and I painfully try to wait on God and the plan I know that He has in store for me. I try to listen for when He will lean down and whisper for me to take the next step. It is in the waiting for the whisper that our relationship with Him grows. It is in the time spent listening that we learn to put aside our plans and embrace His.
