I re-read the book of Jonah today. It's funny how every time I re-read the story I am always a year or two older, and I always get something totally different out of it. When I was little I would read the story almost as a "scare me straight" tactic. I'd read it and tell myself to always do what God told me or else I'd end up in someone's belly. This time I read it and the entire climatic part of being swallowed and saved from the fish didn't even phase me. It was at the end that I found something to hold onto. At the end of the book Jonah sat outside the city of Nineveh to wait to see if God would destroy the city. God arranged for a huge leafy plant to to grow next to him for shade so that he could be comfortable waiting, but God also arranged for a worm to come and eat the plant the next morning. Naturally Jonah get's angry and God asks him, "Is it right for you to be angry about this?"
The plant grew quickly and the plant died quickly. All under God's command.
Jonah didn't make the plant grow. God did. The plant wasn't Jonah's. The plant was God's.
THAT is what got my attention.
Nothing is MINE.
My future isn't mine.
The house I currently live in, isn't mine.
My life, isn't mine.
Is it right for me to be angry that "nothing is happening to me at the moment?
Is it right for me to be angry my parents are moving and I will immediately be forced to grow up and live on my own?
No. They are not mine, they are god's.
God gives, and god takes away.
AND THAT IS OKAY.
Those blessings will come and go, and I will become a stronger person because of it.
I need to cling less onto things and more onto God.
I need to remember to enjoy the blessings I have when I have them.
And when they are taken away from me I will stay faithful in prayer for God's will to be done.
Just something to remember!
xoxo nic.
