What if we stop having expectations and instead started living with expectancy?
This is one of the questions posed by the writers of The Shack.
It made me really think. Hard.
What if I started letting people be who they are--completely. And instead of letting my focus wander to them , I keep my gaze fixed upon Jesus. The Perfect One.
What if I gave every person in my life permission to be themselves? Faults and all?
What if I gave God permission to be Himself in my life. Perfect, All-Knowing, the very definition of LOVE?
What would happen to my expectations of people? If I did it correctly--I would fully expect people to be people--fully human, fully HUMAN.
And my expectations of God. I think my expectations would morph into EXPECTANCY.
No matter what circumstance, situation or life-moment I may happen to find myself, I would live with the EXPECTANCY that God would show up, be revealed, guide, lead, prod and whisper me to where I need to be in that moment. But more importantly--just where HE IS AT THAT MOMENT.
Instead of depending on people to be what I expect them to be, it frees them to be themselves (and perhaps better?), and it frees me to just love. There is no burden on either party. They are free and I am free. No more shackles, no more chains, no more bondage!
Living this way gives God full access to every part of my life. I live expecting God to be God. And I free myself to be his child, in every sense of the word. Just like my children are free to be children, they look to me and trust me to be mom and to handle all of the "mom stuff".
I can have that same freedom.
I never really thought of freedom in this sense,but it is what I have desired for years. I just want the freedom to BE. WHATEVER. ME. WHATEVER.
No more shackles, no more chains, no more bondage, I am free!!! And in turn, I free all of the people in my life to just BE. And I will let God handle the rest. I will live in the expectancy that God will do exactly what He says in the Book of Romans.
Romans 8:28 NASB:
And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.
Amen.
