A month to two months ago, I had what seemed like a million questions for God. I worried about a lot of things and tried to figure out how I was going to make things work. Some questions were very concrete in my mind while others were faraway like pollen in the September/October wind. I kept asking God and asking myself, "How can I...?" and "What do you want...?"
One day a few weeks ago, I was praying a walking rosary in the parking lot while on my lunch break, and God answered one of the larger questions. He waited until I had come to a brick wall of my own wondering. He waited until I had stopped to ask the questions of him that had really been bugging me.
From that point onward, he began answering a lot of other questions. For the first time in my life, answers simply arrived in my lap.
Granted, I have been spending a lot more time as quiet time lately. This has helped. Answers come at random times, but the are knocking on my door in a steady stream. A very steady stream. I am finding lately that I have a lot less anxiety.
I also have a whole new set of questions.
I have decided to wait. I will try to listen, wait, and stay busy with whatever God tells me.
And when I fail at this, as I so often do, I will place reminders in my life to stop and listen again, for I am in constant need of reminders.
The most recent reminder was the death on Monday of a very dear friend. She was in her eighties (I'm 30) and lived in Iowa. My husband and I drove all day Tuesday to attend her funeral on Wednesday and then drove all day yesterday to return to Tennessee. Not only did I get to see beautiful farmland along the way that I had forgotten how much I missed, but I also had a lot of thinking time.
Naturally, the answers God gave to me were not during the thinking/driving time but rather during the busier portions of the trip. God works that way a lot. He takes us where we are and is with us. I'm grateful that God doesn't wait to speak to us only for those times when we are still and listen. If that were the case, I'm afraid I'd still be off, running away from him. Instead, he sometimes whispers, sometimes shouts, sometimes tugs, sometimes pulls, and many times taps on the self-created boundaries we place around our hearts. He wants us to let him in. It's not that complicated. I need to constantly remind myself. It's really not that complicated.
