I lost a $100 last night – it slipped off my pocket while I was taking out my phone and I didn’t notice until this morning. I went back to the place and it was not sitting under a flower, waiting for me to come and get it. I felt bad, especially at this time that every cent counts.

I was very cross with me. “How can you be so careless? It is not the first time something is falling off like that. Why won’t you learn simple lessons that make life easier?” My mum would ask, “How many times would something happen to you before you learn?” Unfortunately, the money was gone. I couldn’t sacrifice-it-forward to God and say, “Ok Lord, wherever it is, I offer it You: use it as You want.” No, I didn’t have that choice and I could not deceive myself nor mock Him with what I didn’t have, much less to give. When I was done chewing myself out, I turned to God: “But at least Abba, You should have alerted me when it dropped? How can you just let that kind of money go like that without prompting me? That is just not fair and I am not happy about it.” He let me chew Him also without a word.

I was supposed to be working on something that I left to go look for the money. Before I left for the search, He told me not to bother but I didn’t want to give it up just like that: “Abba, how can you say don’t go? How can I concentrate on the work when that gap is not closed? At least let me ‘try’ to find it please?” On my way back, when I was done, I said, “Anyway, all this chewing is not going to make this money come back. I need to be more careful, and I shouldn’t have wasted time coming this far for nothing, right Abba?”

Guess what? The Great One smiled and said, “The best truth is the one you tell yourself.” He wasn’t even angry at my blaming Him for my own carelessness. He wasn’t castigating me for not listening when He said not to waste the time to go looking for what was no longer there. It left me not only repentant, but very sober.

How many times do we blame God for things that we missed or messed up? God, why didn’t You save my husband? God, how could You let that happen to my wife? God, couldn’t You have warned my child? You know better, You saw it coming, You should have alerted me? Then how many times does He try to intervene but we are so bent on our way that we barely listen, much less make sense of what He is saying.

My prayer for you and me is, “Abba, open our eyes to see, open our ears to hear, open our hearts to understand, what You would have us do and when all is done, give us peace to find our contentment in You and in Your precious words, amen.” God’s blessings on you and all that is yours.

Glory!