Just looks like a big mess to me

It was a wild flower-strewn hill where the deer would roam in the early morning light.  And in the evenings, they would convene for appetizers before they would descend as a group to the all-you-can-eat  feast on our oak-leaf hydrangeas.  I loved watching for that tribe of deer, their sleek bodies blending among the the trees and flora on the hill.  "Oh, look, there's one, and another over there."  They moved silently and swiftly, appearing often like phantoms when we least expected them.

I went away for a couple of days, and all of that solitude and beauty disappeared, just that suddenly.  After more than ten years as an empty lot, there is suddenly a lot of activity.  And there is suddenly a lot of dirt.  A couple of skip loaders are moving things around, shaving down the hillside, uprooting trees and creating chaos.  It just looks like a big mess to me.  No obvious sense to me.  No evidence of design.  Just big men joyously living out the ambitions of five year old boys, playing in the dirt.

But there is not just a reason for it.
there is a purpose,
there is a plan,
there is a design,
     even if I cannot yet see it.
And the outcome
     the big picture,
          even the details,
 are not dependent
     on my own personal understanding.
It may not be about me after all.

What God is building into me,
what God is doing through me,
how God is working
      does not require a building permit signed by me,
      nor subject to getting my approval.
Despite what appears to be a mess on the surface,
God is working deeper still,
                  even in mystery.
That is what trust is all about.

If I don't understand,
      God's answer is still there.
Dig deeper,
     follow Me into it,
     trust Me anyway.
That is part of what worship is.

About one-third of the Psalms cry out,
"Where are You?"
"What are You up to?"
"We do not like what You are doing!"

And throughout the Psalms,
the answer is manifest:
                God is there.

But as for me,
     my prayer is to You, O LORD.
At an acceptable time, O God,
in the abundance of Your steadfast love
                                 answer me.

                           Psalm 69. 13

The Psalms that start as a cry for help
    end up with praise to our God.
The refrain so often repeated in the Psalms
         "But God..."
 does not point out a different perspective,
      but marks the reality of His Presence.


 And the reason we don't understand
     the roadblocks,
     the hard places,
     the unexplainable "glitches,"
     and in what appears to be inconvenient timing,
is because God is God.
And we are not.

Today, it is a mountain of loose soil
              with no apparent purpose.
Tomorrow...
   well, let's see what amazing thing God does with it.

A sign should be posted:
                  God at work.

And remember once again,
that time in the past when God did the unexpected,
that it was the LORD who brought me through my own "Red Sea,"
        Who did not pluck me out of that impossible situation,
     but Who walked me through on dry ground,
spelling out another story
                        of His faithfulness.

It is not that God doesn't know what He is doing,
               but me.

What I view as dirt,
       God sees differently.
God redeems.

He is before all things,
and in Him
      all things hold together.

             Colossians 1. 17