You guys.  I was on a roll recently with my writing and then I got distracted by this ridiculous television show.  A SPANISH television show where I had to read subtitles.  Thank goodness it was only three seasons or else I guess I’d still have my face in my iPad sitting on the edge of my seat waiting to see what the next catastrophe was going to be for these folks.  How does that happen?

In this case, the explanation seems easy.  I thought to myself, I’ll just find a show that can be background noise for me while I crochet or fold clothes.  Makes sense right?  However the show I picked because it sounded really interesting turned out to be a Spanish show.  So I thought, well I’ll give it a go.  Maybe it’ll help me learn more Spanish.

Except for that’s not how it all went down.  Nope.  See if you’re watching a show that’s in a language you don’t speak really well, you have to actually read the subtitles to keep up with what’s going on.  And this show was a cliffhanger thriller type show, so you don’t want to miss any of the details of who’s hiding what and who’s in cahoots with who.  Whom.  Who.  Whatever.  (Clearly English is also not a mastered skill of mine.)

So here I am all involved in this show and I can’t get anything else done because SUBTITLES.  And by the time that revelation dawned on me, I was in there way too deep, ya’ll.

And I couldn’t help but think how many times the enemy gets me like that.  Not that I’m blaming the Spanish show on Satan.  That was all me.  I jumped right in with both feet on that one.  But in other things, the devil uses distractions to get us to focus on little things that don’t really matter to get our attention off the main thing (which I know I’ve said a million times before, but clearly have not yet grasped the concept of).  He frames these little things in a way that makes it seem like they are uber important.  Suddenly we’re putting all our attention into this one thing that might not really be as important as we think it is.  Or maybe it is important, but it’s not ours to deal with.

I’ve been spending some time looking back over the last few years of my life at the things that I’ve put a lot of focus on.  Some of them were just silly in the grand scheme of it all, but some of them were things to legitimately be concerned about.  Except for I went from being concerned to near being obsessed.  You guys, I wish I could tell you my whole story because I think all this would make so much more sense, and maybe one day I will, but not yet.

What I can say looking back though is that I found myself viewing situations through my own past wounds.  It wasn’t that the things upsetting me weren’t valid.  They absolutely were.  However, some of these battles weren’t mine to fight.  But there I was swinging my sword anyway because in the moment, the pain I saw others suffering was magnified by my own.  Do you know what I mean?  When we have old wounds that haven’t ever healed properly and we see others being wounded as well, it’s almost like ripping the scab off and we’re bleeding all over again and we don’t even fully understand why.  We just know that we’re hurting and somebody else is hurting and it has to stop.

Instead of trusting God to work everything out, I get so easily sidetracked and suddenly I have tunnel vision.  What should happen is that I recognize a wrong, I pray about it and do whatever God tells me to do, even if that is to just be still and wait for Him to make it right.  And that’s hard when you’ve already jumped in with both feet because you’re impatient.  You feel like you have to see the thing through and it has to be right now.

And just like I binge-watched three seasons of non-English show because I couldn’t wait to see how it would end, sometimes I come in like a steamroller because I can’t wait for God to do His thing.  Because He’s not always fast about it.  And somehow I’ve equated praying while waiting with doing nothing.  Which is a lie.

Because if God has said, pray and wait, that doesn’t necessarily mean that nothing is happening.  God’s always at work, always doing.  It just might be that what He’s doing at the moment doesn’t directly involve me.  Maybe for the moment I don’t have a part in the show.  Maybe for the moment, I’m just hanging in the back, taking care of props and lighting while somebody else is on stage.  Just because God’s movement isn’t evident to me in the moment doesn’t mean God is being still.  It just means He wants me to.

So I’m giving Spanish TV shows a rest for now.  I’m also putting my sword in the sheath and letting God do God while I re-learn what it means to trust Him, His timing, and His good intentions towards me and everyone else.

Hasta luego!