Puzzles

It is an activity and hobby that I have loved since childhood.  My mom often had a card table with a puzzle started and sometimes we would sit for just a few minutes while other times we could sit much longer.  I love the challenge and have since passed it on to my kids and grands. 

All of us can sit for hours, starting with the framework and then sorting colors, and each working on separate sections, and then finally placing the sections, according to the picture and bringing it all together. It is quite satisfying when the project is finally complete.

But, as I have written before about puzzles, I still contend that there is something similar to putting a  puzzle together that relates to God and the way he orchestrates the things that happen in our lives. Just hang with me a minute and you too might agree.  

First of all God planner…and nothing that comes in to our lives doesn’t first go through God’s sieve.

There are 1000 pieces tucked away in one box.  

First action is to turn the pieces right side up.

Our first action is to know that God has a plan for each of our lives. He gives us lots of pieces to work with but it takes time to turn them over to see the colors, shapes and opportunities that he has laid before us.

Next make the frame.

God frames our lives with our experiences, our gifts, our choices on what to believe, and who to believe.  He knows our personalities and what motivates us and what distractions get in our way of simply loving God, depending on Him, trusting HIm and following him. 

From there we work to form that many vignettes, one a time.

God fills our lives with joy, and blessings, but he also grows us through trials, successes, disappointments, pain, grief, suffering, and a myriad of other ups and downs.  But each vignettes that we are presented with, God has a reason for allowing it to come our way.  You see, God has the whole picture…we only have been given snippets of the life that God has planned 

The whole picture of the puzzle has already been created and planned out. 

This is just as God has planned and created his purpose for our lives on this Earth. Piece by piece we are living it out.  

We are to trust God as he allows us to experience the goods and toughs that come our way because each one of them is a part of our living puzzle.  

The box cover is the reference point as to where we should place our sections of completion.

Our reference point from God is not for us to see His whole picture …but to ask for guidance as to how to journey forward. He depends on the Holy Spirit to help us know where and how to place our many blessings, and emotions of joy, fear, insecurity, pain etc. in a context that fits God’s perfect plan. If we depend on God to be our reference and our guide, we will find solace and peace in the midst of anything that is before us. 

But there are always pieces that just don’t seem to work until the end…and there are left over spaces that need to be filled and the job gets easier. 

I do believe that some things in this world just make no sense; especially in this broken world that we live in.  But God knows where those pieces fit in our lives.  And sometimes those pieces just don’t look like they would belong to the picture that he is creating within us, oh but they do…for God sees in us a masterpiece and sometimes it is the little things that we feel like don’t belong that help us change a perspective.  God often times opens our eyes to see what he is doing and sometimes he leaves it for our faith to hold tight to.  

Life is a puzzle…we don’t have many of the answers to most of our trials, successes and failures. And sometimes we think we are even missing pieces that would complete our longings, dreams and overcome our sadness or enable us to conquer the monsters in our closet. Even though many times we think we don’t have the missing pieces, it is often not that we don’t have he answers but that we don’t recognize them. God is growing us in his own loving way. Just as a puzzle has pieces of shapes and colors and sizes, so God, in his creative fashion uses all things heaven sent to accomplish his goals to grow us and bring us closer to Him. Have faith and trust him and his ways.

God is always the missing piece to any puzzle.  He is the one who completes us and gives us direction, courage, wisdom and a purpose to share the treasure that he has given to us: one of love, acceptance,  forgiveness and grace.  Enjoy life’s puzzle, one vignette at a time and know God’s masterpiece in you is in the works. One day our life

puzzle will be completed, and the final picture will be a heavenly sight to behold. Our seasonal vignettes will fit together and make sense and our journey will be fulfilled through Christ.  

And just a note here: You just might be a piece of God’s puzzle that he is using to "help someone bump into Jesus"...I heard that quote again today in church and loved it. What a blessing that would be to each of you helped introduce Jesus to someone who did not know of HIS grace, wisdom, love, forgiveness and tender compassion. For all of us who know Christ have the resources of faith and trust that can and will help us to put the pieces of our life in God's hands.He knows where and how ultimately all the pieces of our lives carefully fit together. Just as we look at a puzzle box for clues as to where pieces and vignettes belong, God, when we reach out to him in prayer will direct us as to where to place our feelings, emotions, fears, anxieties, disappointments, joys and successes, so we can build upon them and gradually grow in his His word and accept , with thanksgiving, the many blessings that he has bestowed on all of us.

We all are puzzles, with many pieces, and sometimes it is an overwhelming feat to imagine how God will take all of our life living events and make a genuine masterpiece ... but for us it is by just one piece at a time.... God already has created and seen the completed picture.

Praise God wherever you are and whatever situation He has allowed you to be in . . . His glory will shine through!

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