Grace to *look* down one path, yet to *choose* another: Contentment!

“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;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim
Because it was grassy and wanted wear,
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I marked the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

Robert Frost, 1874-1963

*          *          *          *          *

“Two roads”, one “yellow wood”.  Two (or more) possibilities, one choice.  As I look back over the various “branches” of my life — branches I could have taken, but did not take — I am… content.  For I have come to find that those who are perpetually second-guessing their life-sized decisions are often second-guessing decisions that are not so “life-sized” (What toppings shall we have on tonight’s pizza?, or What if…?  — you can fill in the blank here, for most of us have been around someone who has continually looked back.)

Is it wrong to look back?  Hardly.  Looking back (aka:  “reflecting”) is a great way to learn from one’s past experiences, and to benefit from the many situations (not all entirely pleasant) that one has encountered in one’s life.

Contentment is a grace.

Can one get “stuck in a rut” looking back?  Absolutely!  I once had a college roommate who seemed to be perpetually wishing that she could go “back to the future” and undo various decisions that she had made.  Finally, after having listened to nearly a month’s worth of “If only…” statements, another one of our roommates laid it on the line to the frequent-regretter:  If I could only get you to stop looking backwards at “yesterday”, you’d have a heap more contentment “today“!  Whew!  That truth-speaking roommate knew how to “speak the truth” without tearing out the other roommate’s heart (no small gift, that!).

Contentment is a grace.  Being contented does not mean that one necessarily loves all of one’s past decisions, or relishes all of one’s life’s experiences, but rather, that one can trust (which is a bit different than blaming) the Sovereign hand of God through every path — whether that path leads through a gorgeous “yellow wood” (as Robert Frost described in the poem at the beginning of this post), or that path seems to lead one’s life through a Narnia-like “winter of the soul”, bleak with black-and-white situations, and void of the springtime colors of hope.

You do not know, Gracie, but… my life seems more “winter” now, than “springtime”…

Ah, my dear reader, whether you are now reading this in front of a toasty fireplace with scarcely a care in the world, or whether you are now reading this on a borrowed computer, in a place not familiar to you, and with not so much as a clue where your next food will come from, would you allow me the privilege of reminding you of but one simple thing?  That after “winter”, there is always a “spring”.  That after the black “midnight of the soul”, there is always the daystar, rising in the east.  That after the night, there is always the dawn…  Right now, wherever you are, whatever your situation as you now sit reading these words, you may be struggling to find meaning.  Meaning in life.  Meaning in your present situation.  Meaning following a cataclysmic event.  That search for meaning is a natural response, and a part of the way that God has made and designed each of us — so do not criticize yourself for that desire to “make sense” of a difficult situation.

 Will you let God be “God”?

To change images, consider a large, multi-paneled mural, one panel showing nothing but the blackest blackness, another panel showing a person at the opposite end of a long telescope, intent on peering into the heavens.  If you were to only see the blackest-blackness panel, you might be thinking that there is nothing else to see!  But if you were shown the person captivated by the images visible through the telescope, you would know with certainty that there was more to the mural than simply a black “nothingness”.

And you — a person having a hard time seeing anything right now but the blackest panel of your life right now — you may be having a hard time even imagining that there is anything else to see!  That there is any other part of the “mural” but darkness.  Loss.  Tragedy.  Unfulfilled expectations.

After “winter“, there is always a “spring“.

May I gently encourage you to… “wait with hope” in your situation?  May I encourage you to “hold on to hope”?  And may I urge you to step. back.  Step back — if only in your imagination, for this moment — long enough to see that there is more to the “mural” of your life! 

Changing images again, may I remind you that ripping open the butterfly’s chrysalis will not bring forth a butterfly?  That such a destructive act will destroy the butterfly?  Before you reach for a pair of scissors, or a simple knife to cut open the “chrysalis” that God has placed before your very eyes, will you… wait?  Will you wait with hope, knowing that the evidence is yet unseen that will bridge your hope to your healing?  In the darkness, the confusion, the loss of your present situation, will you reach, with a simple, childlike faith, to the God Whom you right now cannot see?  Will you let Him walk with you through these moments, through the countless unknown, never-before-travelled situations?  Will you let God be “God”?  Will you let Him “see through the dark” for you?

Will you reach, with a simple, childlike faith, to the God Whom you right now cannot see?

Not now, but one day…    One day you will look back to today, to this week, this month, to this time in your life when all seemed hopeless, and life seemed to have lost all meaning, all color.  On that day, you will see color.  Again!  You will know hope.  Again!  And you will know that, even through the darkest of paths, One was walking with you.

Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, Thou art with me.  Thy rod and Thy staff, they comfort me…

Tags: encouragement, Hebrews 11, hope, Robert Frost, Romans 15:13