When disappointments come, I often see myself for who I really am….and I don’t like it.  At all.  See, I hate being disappointed.  I usually go out of my way to have unnecessarily low expectations so that they don’t go unmet.  That’s probably not the most mature way to avoid disappointment, but it’s what I do.

Yet, somehow, disappointments still come.  Shocking, I know.  And when they do, I become childish.  I feel like God has let me down, so I get angry at Him.  I feel like people have let me down, so I get angry at them.  And then I see how faithless and undone I have become by what is often something relatively insignificant, and I get angry at myself.  Is this the real fruit of my life?  Not the good spiritual fruit of Galatians 5, but all of the bad fruit that would indicate a bad “tree”?

I don’t know how to respond.  On one hand, I think I just need more discipline…somehow, I need to figure out how to keep silent, and have an eternal perspective, and respond in faith-filled, heartfelt prayer…but in my own strength.  On the other hand, I think I shouldn’t have to do this in my own strength.  I think God should be doing something to help me…shouldn’t He?  In either case, I feel pretty hopeless.  If it’s up to me, then I feel certain that I will always completely fail.  If it’s up to God, then I wonder why in the world He hasn’t helped me so far.  I’ve been a Christian for pretty much all of my life, but at these times, I feel like such a baby in my faith, and it discourages me.  It’s hard to even want to try anymore.

But I will.

I wonder if that’s part of the lesson for me.  Being faithful in the trying.  Recognizing, again, that who I am is not who I need to be and always yearning to be better, for Him.  I wish the changing came easily.  I wish I had a character that even slightly resembled Christ.  I wish I could understand why things just don’t seem to sink in.  I wish I was more than I am.  But, for now, I just need to cling to the truth that He is faithful to complete the good work He has begun in me…whether I think it’s my effort or His, ultimately, He is the one who has promised to accomplish it.