Days Gone Sideways

No matter how well organized my day, nor how smooth my train is running, it is guaranteed that at some point my train will inevitably derail. It won’t necessarily be anyone’s fault, it just will happen. You will have to slam on your breaks during morning commute and you will be rear ended. Your child will throw a loud and long temper tantrum in the grocery store and you will have to leave. You will start chatting outside with a neighbor and your dinner will burn. You will run out of gas on the way to meet a friend. You will catch the stomach bug. You will sleep poorly. You will oversleep your alarm. Your coffee pot will break. And finally, you will lose it. You will lose it in a small fit of anger. You will lose it and yell at your child. You will lose it in a heap of tears in your kitchen. You will lose it by blaming yourself. And perhaps, before you know it, you are plunging off the cliff with your derailed train.

If you follow my stories on my instagram, you will know that a small question has been bugging me over the past month. I kept asking myself, “why is it that I am more faithful in the big things of life rather than the small, irritating things?” I am quick to cheer on the faithfulness of God in the face of a diagnosis. I bank on the goodness of God when broadsided by divorce. I hedge my bets on God’s victory during the onslaught of calamity. However, when the mundane goes sideways, when my train derails, I am just as quick to plunge into chaos as I was to cheer on God’s faithfulness. And when my response to this minor derailment looks more like an angry wild mare that has been caught in a lasso, and less like a woman clothed in strength and dignity, I always look back with regret.

My faith in a big God is real. The God who walks gently alongside the person facing death and disease and divorce. But what about my faith in the God of the details? The God of the days that go sideways. Dare I say, the God of the sideways? The God who knows every hair on your head and every defiant act your children will throw your way. The God who knows the length of days of the sparrows and every time you will have a flat tire.

So this is what I aim to do. The next time my day goes sideways, I will get off the train. I will survey the train as it derails and remind myself to not go plunging off the cliff with it. I will trust the God who establishes my steps upon the track of life, even when my day looks nothing like my plans. (Proverbs 16:9) And I will look around to see who might need encouragement, thoughtfulness, and kindness, which the pause in my day now afforded me. 

Now, I get it. This is so much easier for me to type than for us to accomplish; however, sometimes sin becomes a settled strategy. Our aim is to untangle sin so we can walk in freedom. So, take a brief moment and picture in your mind’s eye a potential derailment. Got it? I do! Now watch that train derail. Picture yourself getting off the plummeting train and standing alongside your Faithful God. Trust His plans and purposes. Walk with Him along the tracks of His steadfast faithfulness to you, until your train is properly ordered back upon the tracks and you are back at your day again, train running smoothly. 

But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” (2 Corinthians 12:9)