Good day my lovelies!! Summer is almost over, the kids are back in school, and it almost my FAVORITE time of the year, Fall! Prayerfully you all are doing well! I am sure you all have heard the song Good Father, if you have not, check it out on YouTube (My favorite version is by Trey McLaughlin). I think the song is soooo wonderful. It tells us about how our Father is good to us, it says He is perfect in all of His ways, and it tells us how much we are loved by God. There is an old colloquialism used that says “God is good all the time, and all the time God is good!” We have all said it or heard it said! But what happens when we are disappointed by the Father who is said to be perfect in all of His ways and good all the time?

Before you get super religious on me, please get real and admit that you are sometimes disappointed by things that happen in life. There are things that disappoint us that we have caused ourselves and then there are those moments that we ask “Why God?” Some people say that we should not question God. This is not true. God has called us His friends, He can handle our questions, conniption fits, and tantrums. Our questions do not intimidate God. Does He have to answer? No. God is sovereign. Will we always know the answer right then? Not always. Some things we will understand by and by. However, I will say that we do have the liberty to ask questions and seek answers through prayer, fasting, and His word.

I have had many moments where I have been disappointed. I’m sure we all can relate to that statement. The one I want to share is the loss of my brother Joshua. Josh passed away March 31, 2016. I was in disbelief as it was totally unexpected. The images of my last day with him replayed in my head like a movie for almost a whole year every night. He was a good kid. He was a junior in college, was quite popular, and I was so proud of the man he was becoming. After he passed, my great-aunt and I were in the room, and once my denial was over all I could do was cry, lay on his chest and sing a song. The song said “In moments like these, I sing out a song, I sing out a love song to Jesus. Singing I Love you Lord.” No idea where that came from. How could I sing this song at a time like this? My mind was saying one thing, but God was doing something in my heart.

Two weeks before my brother passed, I was at a Women’s ministry event. There was one man there and I understood his daughter was the speaker, but I was still wondering why he was there. She was almost done speaking when I looked behind her and saw that he was slumping over. I got the attention of the other ladies, called 911, and took the kids outside. He was no longer breathing. We all prayed and by the time the ambulance came, he was able to get on the stretcher on his own. This man was 70+ with children and grandchildren and prayer saved his life. Had he been home alone, he probably would have passed. Imagine how I felt after seeing this miracle. If He did it before He can do it again, right? Even then, I wasn’t one to only pray when crisis came, so I should have had some power. I wondered why my prayers worked for this stranger but why not for my brother? Did I not have enough faith? He was only twenty and had so much left to do according to me, my family, and his friends.

The day after the funeral, a friend called me. She had recently lost a very close loved one. She asked me if I was angry and if I found it hard to pray. My response was that I wasn’t angry, but I was disappointed. I hadn’t had the time to pray alone because no one would allow me to be alone during that time, but I told her as soon as I had the opportunity I would. I do remember saying Jesus a lot during that week. That in itself is a prayer. I was letting Him know that I needed him. We have disappointments but we cannot allow them to overshadow who He is. When I sang that song in that moment, that had to be God being a good Father. He was comforting me in a moment when no one else could comfort me. He was being the Father that never leaves or forsakes.

Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 tells us “For everything there is a season, a time for every activity under heaven. A time to be born and a time to die. A time to plant and a time to harvest. A time to heal. A time to tear down and a time to build up. A time to cry and a time to laugh. A time to grieve and a time to dance. A time to scatter stones and a time to gather stones. A time to embrace and a time to turn away. A time to search and a time to quit searching. A time to keep and a time to throw away. A time to tear and a time to mend. A time to be quiet and a time to speak. A time to love and a time to hate. A time for war and a time for peace.” This pretty much explains it all. There is a time for everything. We have to be able to relinquish control. There are some things that have to be given up no matter how tightly we hold on.

The word tells us in Psalms 34:19 “Many are the afflictions of the righteous: but the LORD delivers him out of them all.” This lets us know that we will experience disappointment and pain, but we have a promise. God wastes nothing! It’s up to us to learn the lessons and grow. I felt my prayers didn’t work in that situation, however they just didn’t line up with the will of God for Josh. My brother departed, but I grew in that process. It gave me a new perspective, it gave me the initiative to make major decisions concerning my life, and it gave me a strength I didn’t know I had. I chose to run to God instead of away from him. Challenges grow our faith and build our muscle. We don’t feel it while we’re in it, but we realize it when the storm has passed.

I am sure that you have had a chance to think of the events of disappointment in your lives. It could be a failed friendship or relationship, being overlooked for a job, loss of a job, infertility, or the loss of a loved one. Disappointment is disappointment. It hurts. But we do have a good Father. The situations we thought were failed could have been God protecting us or Him setting us up for something greater. He is always thinking about us and His plans are always to prosper us. He does love us, and if you are anything like me, you will do almost anything to protect someone you love. He literally sent His son to DIE for us because He loves us!

So in moments of disappointment, we can go to our Father. He has all of the answers; He is the ultimate healer, comforter, provider, and sustainer. I pray that we develop the proper perspective of a good Father. I pray that we understand the love He has for us and continue to pursue Him. I pray that we will seek God for encouragement and direction in our disappointment. I pray that we can effectively release the past disappointments to Him and pursue healing. My prayer is that we come out of agreement with disappointment that has caused us to settle in our grief. God help us to remember that the joy of the Lord is our strength. I am thankful for the growth that we will experience as we come to those places of healing and walk in faith. We thank God that He heals the brokenhearted and bandages their wounds. I sooo hope that this was helpful to someone! Love you all so much!

One more thing! Please follow me @mybrokentobeautiful on Facebook for inspiration and love throughout the week! Kisses!!