Parallels

There's something to be said about being able to relate to characters in a story. I think when you can identify with someone in a strong way, it is a powerful reminder that whatever you're going through, no matter how hard/daunting it seems at that moment, you can get through it because you are not alone and others have walked in the path that you're walking now.

Today I am feeling that kind of connection with a character in the Bible named Abraham - yes, THAT Abraham. No, I'm not going to be a patriarch of a great nation that God will use to show His character as well as character of humanity but I can definitely relate to the impatience and frustration of not getting what he wanted when he wanted it. As the story goes, God promises Abraham a son but he gets impatient with God, instead having a son with his female servant Hagar in his own timing and not God's (Genesis 16). Yet God remained faithful and still gave Abraham his promised son = Isaac (Genesis 21).

Then the story gets even juicier when God tests Abraham's willingness to part with the gift that he was given by asking him to sacrifice Isaac, followed by a dramatic intervention, with Abraham passing the test (Genesis 22).

In essence, inherently good things can easily become idols - I am sure Abraham wasn't all too happy to give up his promised son whom he had come to love. But idolatry happens when the gift becomes the item of worship rather than the giver.

A little over three months ago I became very frustrated and angry when someone essentially challenged me to do what Abraham did to Isaac, i.e. be willing to give up your deepest desires and goals for the sake of God, EVEN IF the desire is inherently good. If God wants you to give up something, you should give it up since all that you have now has all been given as a gift to begin with. Yet, the thing I wanted most, I did not want to give up. It was too precious and an inherently good desire -- a desire to have a large family to establish roots in the U.S. and allow future generations of mine to have large family gatherings to look forward to. That is something I grew up with as a child in Korea and that which I wanted to give to my children to have in the future, instead of being isolated and all too nuclear-family oriented as most families are in this all-too individualistic country.

While I still have this goal in mind, it is no longer as big of a concern for me as it used to - in fact, to have a large family you first need a partner/spouse because we all know humans don't reproduce asexually like some plants/fungi do, and if you've been reading these posts you know all too well how obsessed I've been with that. But through God's grace I have been freed from my obsessions with my own goals and my own timing. I am at a place in my life where I am willing to put God's desires and timing above mine because it is clear that His desires are in the end what's best for me - to the extent that if marriage is not in the picture for me in the near future, I am not going to get all frustrated and unhappy as I would have 3 months ago (or even 2 weeks ago).

This kind of contentment is new & liberating, and for that I am grateful.

"See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are." - 1 John 3:1

My favorite passage of the moment: Psalm 32