Christianity Oasis Forum

[dema]

Pouring my heart out in chat - figured I should put some of it here.

I own my own business and have struggled through the recession. A customer asked me to make a big investment, and then never gave me any business in return regarding it. I spent two full months operating expenses on it. That money later came out of my retirement account - almost exactly.

The thing is - the lesson that God is telling me is the right one is.... that I will make wrong choices and that is just part of life. Do I trust God NOW!

Do I trust God after my wrong choices? Do I really believe that God can work all things together for good? Do I believe that when I cast my bread on the waters it will come back? Do I believe that if the devil steals from me he must pay me back many times over? Do I believe?

Do I believe that when I am weak, then God is strong? Do I believe that God can guide me in the dark or through the valley of the shadow of death?

Do I believe that God can work with even such a shabby tool as myself? Do I believe?

I have been in business for 8 + years, and almost all of that time, my daughter worked with me. This week I had to let her go. The blessing had just gone off of it. We were having terrible times getting along when we were both trying so hard and she made a horrible, horrible judgement call (a call that was not hers to make) that embarrased me in front of a customer.

She was a wonderful employee and is a lovely person and she is my baby. And we are both hurting right now very much.

The blessing had gone off of us working together months ago. God will teach us easy, or God will teach us hard. I really missed the easy this time. Just missed it.

Do I trust God NOW?

Yes, I trust God now.

Even though I was mentally unprepared for her leaving, it turns out:

1. I had changed the project structure on every project so that instead of several people answering to her, they were answering directly to me.
2. All her projects were done - I don't know that that has ever happened before in the 8 years. All done and we hadn't even really realized it because they had just gotten done. Her mistake was on a project that was not even hers.

Talk about painless - work wise, her leaving was painless. Emotionally - another story entirely. Mostly because I know how hurt she is.

And the night before she did this thing, I saw a silly show about parents disabling their children by taking too much care of them. I am guilty.

Anyway, God does his thing when we let him. And he leaves his fingerprints when we notice. And sometimes when we think our decision was wrong - it wasn't.

That investment? It involved a software program and training. I called a guy from another company and asked him to attend with our company, which he did. And then he spent a few days in my office and taught us a little about it and did some other work for me. Later, he committed suicide due to being depressed over being unemployed. His mom called and asked me to attend the funeral because I had meant so much to him. I hadn't talked to him in proabably a year. Sometimes life is inexplicable. Why was it important if he committed suicide anyway? Why?

I know I did more than I could for the guy. I paid him more than I could afford. And he knew I wanted to hire him some day.

So, I have no guilt, shame or blame on that one - not even in my wildest dreams - but it makes me wonder???

What IS God doing?

But I do trust God NOW.

[dema]

I took my daughter's daughter out tonight and when I returned her, my daughter invited me in and we talked about all sorts of things - avoiding the subject that hurt - but talked about most everything else on our minds. And hugged goodbye. Healing is well on its way. Thank you for your prayers.