Devotional Series -- Week 2: The Game of Life

In this second week of devotionals, I am posting a piece I wrote back in 2003. It was the first thing I ever had published, in HomeLife Magazine. Though not written in a “devotional” format, I pray that it will speak to someone’s heart. It was written in the midst of my husband’s extended job loss, a difficult life event for our family.

The Game of Life

Growing up, my brother and I loved to play board games together. Occasionally, one of us would draw a card or land on a space that instructed us to, “Go back to the start.” The one who escaped such a fate would gloat while the recipient would moan over the thought of having to backtrack and start again.

Fast forward 23 years. I experienced those same feelings of frustration and discouragement when my husband lost his job. I felt I’d drawn the “Go back to the start” card in my life, much to my dismay. Starting over was not my first choice, especially with three preschoolers in tow. And this time the game of life was much more real: real players, real struggles, and even, real money. Our journey led us down a path of fear, doubt and loneliness that I had never before known.

Over the years I had dealt with all of these feelings at one time or another. But never before were they attached to such a major issue in my life. For a self-professed type-A personality, sitting helplessly on the sidelines was difficult. Common Christian phrases such as “Let go and let God” came to mind. Perfect for slogans on posters, they were harder to put into practice. For months I watched as we maneuvered down a road filled with dead-end leads and broken promises.

Everything in our world was changing. Our outlook certainly had. My usually gregarious husband suddenly gravitated toward people who knew his situation. Squelching his outgoing personality helped him dodge new people who would ask, “So, what do you do for a living?” Friends became distant. Loved ones didn’t know what to say. Defenses were up, and spirits were down.

Trying to be a loving wife, caring mother and devoted follower of Christ became difficult. Even dropping my children off at preschool took on new meaning as I watched seemingly carefree parents come and go while I was dealing with my private pain. I looked just like they did on the outside, but I was sure I was different on the inside.

And then I met Christine. Perfect hair, perfect child, perfect Volvo. Only, her life wasn’t perfect. Her husband was also out of work, even with an Ivy League degree. And I learned right then and there that everyone has a story beneath what we see on the surface.

Days and months went by. Friends searched alongside us for the meaning in it all. Observers asked, “What’s God tyring to teach you through all this?” It was as if they assumed God caused our situation in order to reveal deep truths to us that we didn’t already know. Yet, instead, I kept coming back to the childhood lessons taught to my by my parents so many years before…God is love. God loves me. God cares. God sees and knows. Simple lessons, yet amazingly profound.

And what I found in the midst of some very dark days was that God was there. He does love me. And He does have my best interests in mind, even when I don’t really know what that means.

There is no other way to play the game of life than to do it with endurance, faith, hope and trust – trust in the One who gave me the life in which to play it.

Lisa
P.S. I hope you’ll come back on Thursday when I will be posting about our very exciting Second Chance Prom this past weekend. Can we say, FUN?