Playing Where's Waldo With God

Imagine you went in to see the doctor for a check up.  The doctor sends you to radiology to get a picture of one thing and the radiologist notices you have cancer.

How would you react?  How would your family react?  What would happen to your world starting at that moment?

It doesn't have to be cancer.  Let's say you and your spouse found out you are pregnant and the baby dies?  You go through a period of depression and morning that finally ends when you get a new baby but that one dies too?

How would you deal with something like that?

Well, it's not all hypothetical.  Things like this actually happen to real people.  Every instance is life changing and has the possibility to become an event that ends your happiness.  It's terrible, it's scary, it's confusing and frustrating.

Life would be so much better if the victim of devastating life situations such as this were given an opportunity to decide if the situation was good or bad, but let's face it, there's no good to be found in something like: "You have Multiple Sclerosis and someday you won't be able to walk."

Consider life as a book of "Where's Waldo" puzzles.  On each new page is a picture with mass confusion and chaos.  Somewhere in the picture is a guy named Waldo who is wearing black suspenders, a shirt with red and white stripes, and apparently the same clothes as every other time you've met him. 

The game is to sift through all the noise, confusion, and distraction until you can finally solve the puzzle by finding Waldo.  Once you find him you get a brief moment of joy as suddenly the chaos and confusion are totally unimportant because all of your focus is on Waldo and all the other parts of the big picture just don't matter anymore.  You savor this moment for a time then suddenly a quick turn of the page plunges you back into a brand new quagmire of confusion, frustration, and distraction as you find yourself trying to navigate your way through a new, different, and often harder puzzle.

Life often contains situations not unlike the "Where's Waldo" book.  Things are familiar and easy, then without warning the page turns and we are plunged into a confusing and frustrating puzzle. 

The key thing here, is to understand that buried somewhere in all the noise and confusion, God has hidden a little Waldo that he calls a blessing.  While the blessing is unseen, it is tiny and seemingly impossible to figure out.  We spend vast buckets of time searching through, and focused on, the chaos.  We get frustrated as we wander aimlessly about the puzzle and simply repeat our failures. We spend so much time in the chaos and confusion that it's easy to have that, rather than the blessing, become what we focus on.  As long as we are making that mistake, the blessing eludes us.

Once we spot the blessing, however, it becomes the subject of our focus, and the chaos and confusion quickly fades into noise that is a very minor inconvenience at worst, or a mosaic background that accents our Waldo blessing at best.  From that point on when our eyes enter what used to be confusing and frustrating, they jump straight to the blessing and the chaos fades into the background.  Now it's familiar.  Now it's all about Waldo and the noise is unimportant.  Now it's easy...

Until God decides it is time to turns the page.

On page 991 of the bible we are told not to worry about our life and asked "who, by worrying, can add a single hour to his life?"  it goes on to tell us to seek the kingdom of God and his righteousness and these other things (our daily needs) will be given to us. 

We have a choice.  Want miserable?  Focus on the chaos and confusion.  Get caught up in the hopelessness and frustration of the puzzle and lose sight of the Waldo that is lost in the situation.  Focus on the situation so completely that you allow yourself to worry that maybe the Waldo isn't even there. 

Want the blessing instead?  Focus on it.  Understand that the noise makes blessing better.  More noise, more confusion, and more chaos only makes the blessing that much better when it is finally revealed. 

Learn to enjoy and anticipate the blessing even before you find it.  Focus on the blessing during the chaos and confusion and before you know it, it's all about Waldo.  Once you learn this approach you will have no problem going on to the next page (or even getting the advanced book with the biggest nastiest puzzles).