Ok, so you've had a disappointment. Things didn't go your way. You didn't get what you wanted. Life is full of disappointments. This one won't be your last, that is for sure. Life is too short to sit around boo-hooing...there is work to be done! I used to say "Suck it up Buttercup!" but my daughter said to me this morning, "Suck it up, Cupcake!" which I thought was totally appropriate for her to say!
It is ok to have feelings of disappointment. It is natural and very human of us to have these feelings. It is also very natural and human for us to get angry and throw a hissy fit when we don't get our way. Have you ever seen a toddler throw a fit when they don't get what they want? No one taught them to act that way...it is just what comes natural. But, toddlers grow up and learn that throwing a fit usually only makes matters worse...well, some of us grow up and learn that lesson.
"When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me." 1 Corinthians 13:11
I think part of the reason our world seems so messed up, mixed up and dangerous is that we don't heed those words enough. We all want our own way and get mad when it doesn't happen that way and we yell, call people names, scream, stomp our feet and stomp all the way out the door. Now tell me, how is that obeying the commandments that according to Jesus were the most important: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment.
And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself'" Matthew 22:37-38
When we want something really bad, we pray for it, ask others to pray for it and WISH it to happen, and when it doesn't, we assume that prayer doesn't work and we get mad at God. That is just flawed thinking. God says he hears our prayers and answers our prayers...it may just not be in our timing or in the way we thought they we would be answered. The sooner we learn that, understand that and grasp the importance of that, the sooner we will be able to move on to and the less time we will waste crying and complaining about how we didn't get what we want.
But, we must give ourselves time to get over it. Our hurt human feelings need time to heal. We mustn't beat ourselves up for having those feelings. God made us the way we are, and he made us with feelings. Reading the Bible, prayer and talking with wise friends are good ways to work through those feelings. Remind yourself of all the blessings in your life. Remind yourself where you would be without those blessings. Talk to someone about it and don't hold it all in to fester into bitterness that will spill out into other areas of your life. Bitterness toward someone else does nothing but cause YOU hurt and sorrow.
So your prayer wasn't answered the way you thought it should be...God has a plan for you. "For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." Jeremiah 29:11
Suck it up, Cupcake! There is work to be done and life to be lived!
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