Forgiving the Process...

So one of the things I was struggling with in all of everything, is why God let certain things happen. There were things that I didn't feel like I needed to go through to get to where I am today... but there are things that I went through that will eventually help others. So my question this weekend was this, "I know that God loves my soul more than he loves my earthly life... but does he love other peoples' souls more than MY earthly life?"

A friend of mine asked me, "Well is it all about you? Or is it all about Him?"

And he was right, if it is going to bring more people to Jesus then I can't say it isn't worth it in the end. Still it was a lot to think about.

Last night I finished Sheryl's book and towards the end she starts talking about all the hard stuff and the whys... some of the stuff that I have been thinking about. She even repeated some of the things that my friend had said in conversation. Which is funny, because if I had read and THEN he said it, I would have assumed I had inadvertently steered the conversation that direction... but to have him say things and THEN read them in the book... awesome.

So anyway, back to Sheryl... So then she said something that explained it all...  while she knew she didn't have to forgive God because he does all things well... she had to come to terms with forgiving the process... understanding that each thing had to happen for the whole plan to work... Forgiving the process and the people who were part of it.

While I've struggled with a lot of things, forgiveness isn't the biggest struggle for me. I love people. I am more likely to forgive too easily than to hold on to something for a long time. But I as I sat with that concept for a bit and reread it again... that section about forgiving the process and the people who were part of it... I was reminded of something. I was part of the process.

All the whys that I have been dealing with weren't REALLY about why God let me run into the person who steered me the wrong direction. They weren't REALLY about why this person did this or that that caused me to react the wrong way...

They were about me forgiving myself for making the mistakes in the first place.

Because while the decisions were stupid, while I am still struggling with some of the repercussions of them, and while I am still scarred by a lot of them... God knew they were going to happen and decided that, instead of being angry with me or turning away from me or smiting me on the spot, He would let grace cover them and He would weave them into His awesome chess game...

So, while I was proud of what happened with that sweetheart in a previous post, when I looked back at the "conversation" Gmail made of all our emails from over a year ago, I was pretty overwhelmed with the stupidity and lack of self-worth I saw in those emails. How had I ever thought that it was okay to talk/behave like that?

But if I choose to believe that it had to be part of the process, then it's not that I'm taking away any of my own responsibility for it... it's just that I'm forgiving myself for the mistakes, understanding that God will turn them into something beautiful.