It’s Not Supposed To Be This Way: A 5-Day Challenge By Lysa TerKeurstSample

What If I Want My Happily Ever After Now?

Certain. Comfortable. Predictable.

These are all words I long to use to describe my life. My normal.

I suspect you’d be okay with these being the defining terms of yours, as well.  

But the Lord makes it clear in His Word that things will not always go as we wish they would in this life between two gardens:

In this world you will have trouble. (John 16:33)

Each day has enough trouble of its own. (Matthew 6:34)

Dear friends, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal that has come on you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. (1 Peter 4:12)

Can I be honest? All this trouble gets exhausting.

Walking in the “I don’t know” is scary. 

And that’s where we get weary and the tentacles of the fear of the unknown can have strangling effects on us.

Fear seems to be a close cousin of disappointment. They are related, because we feel them so deeply, they paralyze us so easily, and the pat answers so many Christians try to place on them trip us up. We are desperate to make things easier than they really are. 

I get it.

But in this life between two gardens that’s just not how most things work out. We get through one disappointment and then another comes. And another.

We all keep thinking, if we can just get through this circumstance, then life will settle down and finally the words happily ever after will scroll across the glorious scene of us skipping happily into the sunset.

But what if life settling down and all your disappointments going away would be the worst thing that could happen to you?

What if your “I don’t know” is helping you, not hurting you?

What if your “I don’t know” is helping you let go of things you aren’t supposed to know, because that knowledge would be too heavy a burden for today? But the One you do know, the Lord, is so perfectly capable to bear it all.

Remember those verses we just read about troubles? Here they are again in the context of the full passages:

“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33)

“But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has

enough trouble of its own.” (Matthew 6:33–34)

“Dear friends, do not be surprised at the fiery ordeal that has come on you to test you, as though something strange were happening to you. But rejoice inasmuch as you participate in the sufferings of Christ, so that you may be overjoyed when his glory is revealed.” (1 Peter 4:12–13)

The crucial detail for us to have peace in the middle of everything we face is to stay close to the Lord.

We think we want comfort in the I-don’t-know times of life. But comfort isn’t a solution to seek; rather, it’s a by-product we’ll reap when we stay close to the Lord. 

RESPOND: How might your season of “I don’t know” actually be helping you, not hurting you? Which verse from the reading today encouraged you the most about this? Commit to memorizing it this week.