Role Reversal
“The heart of man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps.” – Proverbs 16:9
My planner was always monochrome. Not because I only used black pens growing up, or something like that, but because I never wrote in them. The only ink that touched the page was from the factory where it was produced. The single use I had for the Scholastic planners we were given as kids was the fun facts in the bottom corner. Like the time I learned that Hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia is the fear of long words, which, given the nature of this condition, who is this name actually helping? Flash forward to college where I meet a girl whose planner made the Sistine Chapel look like finger-painting. Contained within was an array of colors and highlighted segments to bring life and meaning to the near minute-to-minute schedule of this Illinois native. She had her life together; and I laughed.
So can somebody explain to me how the exact opposite is true for us in our current reality? Just a few days ago, Taylor shared the unfamiliar experience of having neither a schedule nor an alarm clock set. Her express objective this month, as determined by the organization, is to follow the Lord’s leading each day. Meanwhile, I’m still stuck on the alarm clock part because I have two separate ones in the morning, reminders for tasks at work and calendar event alerts multiple days out. My calendar has three different color-coded sheets for added depth and functionality, not including everything else on my icaledar app.
Yeah we got a good laugh out of this switcheroo.
You’re real funny God. Hysterical.
This isn’t the only aspect of our relationship that has flipped during the past nine months. In fact, there is one dynamic in particular that needed to be completely reversed; it took the World Race to reveal it.
Planning for the future can be a useful practice. I’m sure many have succeeded or fallen based on the preparations made in advance. I had my own plans about what our relationship was going to look like as well as the timeline when we would hit those milestones. But this becomes my downfall when I step out of my proper role as “way planner” and attempt to coup the throne of “Lord Establisher” in my life. I want to be the one to determine and bring to fruition the plans I’ve made for Taylor and I. For example, we were supposed to be married by now. We were supposed to be living in the same neighborhood and house. We were supposed to be communicating each day. We were supposed to actively pursue each other’s heart. We were supposed to daily grow in the deep friendship we’ve been blessed with. But there is a cosmic imbalance when I try to establish the destiny of my or other’s lives; a task reserved solely for the Lord of Hosts.
It was not my plan for Taylor to go on the World Race. It’s hard to date a World Racer. We don’t get to invest frequently in the friendship that we share. I don’t get the same opportunities I once enjoyed to invest in her heart, nor do they look remotely the same. I won’t even mention the frequency of failed Facetime calls or blame her Wi-Fi for the breakdown of communication. Her neighborhood changes every single month and sometimes her house has been a thin layer of plastic covering the ground where she sleeps. And don’t get me started on how a daily struggle is questioning whether God still has us on the same path we once planned for.
We live two separate lives. One of us contemplates installing a secondary shower head for fun and the other bathed out of a bucket for a time. One of us doesn’t always know where the next meal is coming from, let alone its nutritional value, while the other complains when he craves Chick-Fil-A on a Sunday. One of us exists within communities that have nothing and yet possess everything and the other wrestles with a community that has more than it could ever want but little of what it truly needs. It’s painful to wake up every day and desire, with all your heart, to see, walk and talk with the one you love more than any other human being. The person whom you want to build a tomorrow with can’t share in the joys of the day because they aren’t there. Sometimes, simply to just survive, your heart closes off towards them just to keep from feeling so empty.
However, in this tension, God has revealed a powerful truth: “Whoever finds their life will lose it, and whoever loses their life for my sake will find it” (Matthew 10:39).
God has called Taylor to a journey that was different than what we planned because there are people around the world who need her. She had to give up the immediacy of life together in order to gain the abundance of life available in pursuing Christ globally. God has called me to a journey that was different than what we planned because there are people here who need me. I had to give up the immediacy of our life together in order to gain an abundance of life pursing Christ in Peachtree City. Losing the plan we initially had has given birth to a new life in Him as He establishes our steps. Our roles needed to be reversed with Him so that the plans to prosper and not to harm, plans to give a hope and future could rule in our lives (Jeremiah 29:11). And this funny thing happens when you step out in faith and trust God to establish, however little sense it makes at the time, it leads to greater joy than you could have imagined! God has blessed and grown us in ways we couldn’t have possibly foreseen. Despite the distance He continually brings our hearts closer together in preparation for what He is establishing next.
This may not have been the way I, or we, wanted our journey to play out, but I could not have written a better story. I thank God for the blessing and influence Taylor has been in my life and the transformation left in her wake as she so graciously, and fiercely, loves the nations. While I await the hour when we will be reunited and walk in proximity together, I will hold onto my plans with an open palm as the Author of Life has His way in establishing our steps.
I love you Taylor Schmidt.
P.S. – It really is your Wi-Fi.
