Expectations

I see that I am writing more posts each month. From the inception of this blog, I have incrementally added one post each month. I know, it's not really a big deal, but it's the kind of stuff that I notice (why I don't know, probably the same reason I memorize and retain useless knowledge but struggle to memorize Greek).

This morning I was inspired by a devotion that I get emailed to me. It's nice to sit down to the computer and have this time to stop, focus on God, and then attack the day. It doesn't always work that smoothly, but usually on Monday the first thing I do when I wake-up is check my email (secretly hoping for an email from my Greek professor that class is canceled for some reason). Here's a link to the devotion I read, "In Its Own Time"

What really struck me about this devotion was the perspective for all situations to not "be hung up on where it might go". It really caused me to think about a lot of things that I approach in life. I have clear expectations (even if I won't admit them) about pretty much everything I get myself into. I expect when I go to Hardee's (I guess it's Carl's Jr. here in California) that I will be able to get my "heart-attack-on-a-bun" (aka the Monster Burger). I expect when I go to a rock concert that it's going to be loud. You get the idea.

I think the idea is not so much that we shouldn't have expectations, but that we shouldn't be so stuck on them that we cry like a baby when things don't go our own way. I have experienced the negative side of this a lot when I visit churches. It seems like we all have expectations for what we expect to get from the church. We expect that the church will meet our needs. We expect that God will do things in our time. But we are reminded in Ecclesiastes, there is a time for everything; and the underlying message is that it may not always be our time.

I needed that message today, as I sleepily got ready to go to my Greek class; as I knew I would be getting a quiz, but wasn't sure exactly the quiz would be like; as I conversed with friends before and after class.

If I'm not hung up on where things might go, or another way it was put in the devotional I read, if I'm not "attached the outcome" I will approach the outcome more positively. Maybe it won't be what I expected, but it will be what God had planned.