Choices

I have never been good at making choices.

I picked out my first American Girl doll, Samantha, only after my cousin Leslie picked her first.
The second one, Addy, was exactly the same situation.

I ended up going to the University of Michigan
because I prayerfully picked it out of a hat
after I cried in indecision 6 days before the deadline.

I think I may be the only person that
cried for two days after getting offered
my first teaching job.

Last year, after I signed my teaching contract,
I walked half way to the office to turn it in,
only to turn around and walk back into my room.
Then I turned it in a half hour later.

Looking back, I don't think I regret a single "big" choice I have made.
Yet, at the time, I fear the possibility of regret, of walking out of God's will.

I always wish that I could be 100% sure of a choice I make.
In reality, I think I have only ever been 73% sure of any choice.

Robert Frost's poem says it well in "The Road Not Taken":

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth.

This is how I often feel. Two roads appear in front of me,
and I know I have to choose.

I strain my neck to see what the future holds
with one decision or the other,
but I can't see.

I can't see the future. I can't see what the future holds
for any particular earthly choice.
But I want to.

desperately.

So I pray.
And I hope. And I struggle.
And I do what I think God wants for me, and I believe that
He has what is best.
And He often tells me in a whisper when I want him to
tell me in a blaze of fire or roaring thunder.

And I know that all I can do is pray and struggle with Him,
knowing that He will guide my footsteps.

I have been listening to Brandon Heath a lot lately,
and I am moved by these lyrics in his song, "Trust You":

It's never easy changing direction.
It's so unnatural to loosen up my grip.
Are You growing weary of my good intentions?
But I know that You don't work that way.

I'm not gonna fight You anymore.
I'm not gonna try to lock the door.
I needed life, You gave me Yours.
You took Your life and gave me Yours.
There's no reason why
I shouldn't trust You with mine.

I realize that trusting Him with my life is a daily decision.
Because I daily doubt His goodness and provision for me.

But when I think about it, He has guided me in every decision
and every moment so far,
and I know that I can trust Him for tomorrow.
Even when I can't see it.