Much of the disappointment I experience in my life has to do with my very vivid imagination...how easily I get carried away in the beauty of a story as I would write it, and how attached I get to what I have defined for each character or part. I have quite a knack for getting the details all wrong, thinking they are pointing in one direction (the direction of my hopes) while they may have little to do with what is really going on. It prevents me from sight, from really loving people for who they are, where they are, and what God is doing in their life. It prevents me from recognizing my own worth, as I can barely live up to the unrealistic roles I have assigned for myself. At times it leads me to blame organizations or institutions, entire groups of people for not living up to what I expected them to be. (Gordon-Conwell and Campus Crusade for Christ are two cases in point, both which served important purposes in their time. Ah heck why not also mention the entire Mormon church). In the end, when my eyes are finally opened, I look around and realize I have flown far far away, often from people who have loved me all along, who could never have lived up to or imagined what I needed them to be. Sometimes I think my biggest struggle with God is all just one big misunderstanding, and when all the colors as I have imagined inevitably start to smear, I come to find that He was there all along.
And the truth will set you free.
