Always, a Bigger Plan Awaits

One of the women in our homeschool group has a tag at the end of each of her emails which reads, "There's always a bigger plan".  Reading it the other day, it struck me anew how true that is, and how cool, in a way, this statement (and it's reality) is.  When I tie this saying into a faith in God, the bigger plan leads me to hope, to the possibility in something good coming out of a trial of life, in the glimmer of positivity emerging from something that I wanted to happen not occurring, or some material thing that I thought I was going to recieve not ending up in my hands.  I have trouble sometimes finding a comfort in this idea; I fight with God a lot, kick and scream and shake fists in the air when I don't get my way.  At the end of the ranting and pleading and crying, however, when I finally arrive at  my tired, resigned place, a tiny bit of possibility can shine through the crack in that door I firmly (and loudly) slammed shut.  If I open the door a bit wider, brilliant rays of sunshine can pour through the portal, illuminating the situation, possibly carrying a bit of peace with it.

My Mom is frantic about the hurricane currently barrelling up the east cost.  Her email yesterday carried with it waves of anxiety which I could feel just the same as if I was standing in the room with her when she typed it.  Irene brushed by Florida yesterday like a Victorian lady in a hoop skirt, the hem of her lacey dress tickling our coast, bringing with her bands of rain and  pleasantly cool breezes.  Far from the catastrophe predicted by weather forecasters, the storm provided us a welcome break from summer's swelter, though the weekend is supposed to provide us with ridiculously high temperatures.  From what I've heard about Irene's entry into North Carolina, the Victorian lady is now under the throes of major PMS.  I fear that the results of her visit there will be more violent and a whole lot less welcome. I still hope to fly out tomorrow, but we're on a "wait and see" basis.  I have to believe somehow that if Sparkle Fairy and I don't board that aircraft tomorrow then we weren't meant to be on it, that maybe there will be a reason for us to take another flight.  The tiniest moments can have the greatest of effects.  Who knows when we'll be called on to touch the life of another person, when us being in the right place at the right time will allow God to work through us, to allow us the beauty of doing his work?  Sometimes a shift in our plans might allow a bigger and better plan to emerge.

I was struck with an idea this morning so powerful that I dialed my husband up to tell him.  I feel strongly, in my gut, that we're supposed to go to North Carolina.  We've talked about this before, and fantasized about living there, but I always revert back to my desire to go home to Massachusetts.  Actually, that desire hasn't changed one bit.  Still, this morning, after my husband had very unhappily left our home to head to work at a job that daily heaps great mounds of stress upon his shoulders, saying that he wished he knew how to have a faith that would move mountains (or, in this case, just us), a gentle voice pierced the silence in my mind.  North Carolina.  There's a bigger plan.  Trust me.  I honestly have no idea what we would do to make money if we moved to North Carolina.  A recent conversation with a business associate revealed that land might still be purchased for a decent price there, and N and I have always said we'd build a log cabin home if the chance to live in or near the mountains ever presented itself.  Those too can be had at a reasonable cost. And, we have some family there; my cousin resides in North Carolina with his wife and their two small children.  When that thought broke through the sadness I felt over my husband's lamenting, the hows and whys didn't have much of an effect on me. I knew it was truth, down to my bones.

There's always a bigger plan. Wait and see.