Not That!

Last year I took on a volunteer role at school that I didn’t want to do. It required two things—organization and coordinating people. I can organize, but I don’t particularly like to lead, or even organize, people. So at the end of last school year I purposefully took on a different job, one in which the duties involved organization alone. No dealing with other people.
 
Or so I thought.
 
Suddenly I find myself thrust into the same position I hated, but on a larger scale, and in addition to the job I so smugly assumed was my protection against the other. Yesterday I was ready to scream and cry and throw a bit fit. But after looking again and again at the other options (of which there weren’t any), a thought suddenly struck me: maybe the Lord allowed this. Maybe He wants me to learn how to deal with people.
 
Not a happy thought, let me tell you. I don’t like it. I don’t do it well. It frustrates me to tell people what needs to be done and have them ignore or dismiss me. And yet, in spite of finagling my life to avoid such a thing, here it is again. So I am accepting this as the hand of the Lord. Teaching me. Stretching me. Again. Continually. It never stops. Even when I feel like protesting that I’m as grown up as I want to be. It all goes back to that word the Lord spoke to my heart so many years ago: I love you so much I have to grow you up.
 
It’s one small lesson amidst a lifetime of others. Maybe I can get it one right this time. Or at least more right than I got it last year.