On Thursday night at 11 p.m., I bought a plane ticket --> IND the next morning. I wouldn't recommend buying tickets less than 12 hours in advance if you can avoid it (ouch!), but when family calls, you answer. Ephesians 5:19 is all "speak to one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs" . . . but I've been listening to a lot of trashy pop lately due to all of this traveling, so let's go that route instead.
Friday morning started out all *airplane, airplane, sorry i'm late / i'm on my way so don't close that gate.* After 4 hours of sleep and some coffee that my roommate preset for me the night before (thanks, S!), *I brushed my teeth with a bottle of Jack* (false) and was on my way to BWI. It took me longer than I expected to drive there, and even longer to find parking, so I was a little stressed by the time I got on the bus at Lot B. I put that stress to good use by directing everyone in front of me in line at the AirTran ticket counter on how to use the kiosks more effectively. "Excuse me, ma'am - that one's open. And if you're not using it, sir, could you please step aside so that the this lady - yes, you, go - can use it?" That reduced my waiting time by at least 10 minutes, easy. But when I finally had my printed boarding pass in hand, I realized that the security line was already, before 7:30 a.m., backed up down the hallway and around the corner. We're talking hundreds of people. I was prepared to give up and walk directly back to my car and spend the next 12 hours *riding solo,* Jason Derulo style, west on I-70. Fortunately, the guy next to me in line was a jolly old dude who used to be a famous surfer (or so he says) on his way back to march in a surfer parade in Huntington Beach. That Californian was the Snoop Dogg to my Katy Perry and convinced me to stay in line. All I could do this entire time was pray, "Please, God, just let me on the plane. I can't miss this flight! Just let me on the plane!" As you can probably guess, I made it with two minutes to spare.
Half an hour later, though, we were still sitting on the tarmac. We were eventually deplaned due to some sort of mysterious technical difficulty. It was then that I realized: my prayers have been entirely too small.
God got me on the plane, just like I asked, but what good did that do me? I was getting right back off it without moving a single inch! I was so caught up in getting to the end of the line in front of me that I forgot what my final destination was. I failed to trust that God would get me there even if I didn't understand the invidual steps in the process - - and get me there He did.
I don't mean that we shouldn't pray for the specifics. In the Lord's Prayer, we're taught to ask God for our daily bread. But before that, we pray that His will is done on Earth as it is in Heaven. When life gets crazy (and trust me, this was a crazy week), it's natural - and good - to take things one step at a time. But when we pray, we ought always to keep the larger narrative arch in mind.
I can tell that lesson is really resonating with people, because after telling it to my little brother last night, he said, "I also had an epiphany today, which was that we shouldn't let Em tell such long stories anymore."
Anyway, I'm so grateful that we don't have to *pretend that airplanes in the night sky are like shooting stars* - our deepest wishes are known by a good and loving God who takes them seriously.
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