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| New Smyrna Beach, Florida, December 28, 2011 |
I am once
again brushing up against a profound spiritual truth about the gifts hidden
within adversity, pain and apparent loss.
If a powerful soul lesson could fit neatly into the lyrics of just one song, it
would probably have to be Country Western! This truth about hidden gifts would
fit best for me in Garth Brook’s “Unanswered Prayers.” The lyrics are about
having run into an old high school flame and having the powerful realization (and
deep gratitude) that, despite diligent prayers back in the day, there was total
grace in things not having worked out with this particular person the way he had
so desperately wanted them to. Here is
the link for you to listen if you would enjoy hearing it: http://bit.ly/J10kw.
But this is a
truth that goes across contexts, and it is not just about life partners. I
recall the sense of despair we had when my husband got fired when he was
expecting a promotion! His boss had been manipulating the books and skimming
cash from the company, and John had gone to a district supervisor. The audit
was welcome, but the results unexpected—the whole team got fired! Shortly after that,
a family crisis (John’s father had a major stroke) helped us see the gift of
being in our hometown so we could offer support to his mother.
In a message
on January 8, 2012, part of a series on Quantum Living, Reverend Janice Cary,
pastor at Unity of Fort Pierce, Florida, referred to your ability to see the
bigger picture and to recognize the grace within every event in your life as quantum
thinking. There must be something in the air about this right now, because on
January 9, 2012, Russell Bishop, an educational psychologist, author, executive coach and management
consultant based in Santa Barbara, California, wrote in “Soul-Talk: What Happens When God
Closes a Door?” (See http://huff.to/wZrDIm):
“…[A]
whole lot of things had to be removed in order to make way for the next level
of opening. As much as it may have appeared to me that God was closing a door,
He was really opening a whole new universe.”
This year, one
of my goals is to feel this truth of the hidden gifts, even of unanswered prayers, right in the midst of the normal chaos, change,
disappointment, and uncertainty we call life. It is my intention to live in
that beauty of the bend of the earth where the ocean meets the sky.
