God

Because I want you to accomplish everything you desire. Because I want you to have everything you want.

And you will.

Just not yet.

At my job, I deal with a lot of people's perceptions about God.

The supreme creator.

The unintelligable spirit.

The non-existant myth.

The scape goat.

The reason for everything.

People just like to assume that if God is omnipotent, but not preventing pain, he is malevolent. That whatever personal crisis they are facing at the particular moment, whether it be the death or illness of a loved one, a seemingly unfair lot in life, a complete inability to trust – it's God's fault. That he gave their grandmother cancer. That he made them gay. That he personally reached his hand down and pushed the water that became the tsunami that killed thousands of people.

All I have to say is, if that's who people think God is, no wonder the world is growing increasingly atheist.

I can't explain the mysteries of the universe, or even explain why your grandmother has cancer. But that quote at the beginning of this? That's one of the last things he's said to me. And that is what I know God to be.

Everything has a time, and a purpose.

And if he needs me to face my biggest fear, that's fine by me.

Throughout my mission, other missionaries would talk about the spiritual confirmation the had received that they should go on a mission. How they just knew that it was something they needed to do.

You know what I did? I spent a summer watching friends and acquaintances drink, get tattoos, and skip church, and then I submitted my mission papers. I barely even thought about it at all. I figured “now's as good a time as any”, and then I just did it. It didn't even hit me, what I was doing, until after I had entered the MTC.

That's how I feel now. People around me keep getting these spiritual confirmations about things I haven't even thought of yet. Things like marriage, and babies, and careers, and the list goes on and on. And here I am.

No job lined up.

No set plans except “go to thailand”.

Nothing pushing me forward. Nothing holding me back.

And I don't even feel pressured. Stressed. Anything at all.

And somehow that means I'm.... reckless? Unprepared? 

What makes my lack of plans less spiritually valid than your intricately laid ones?

I will have everything I want. Just not yet.

And that not yet? It's as meaningful as your right nows.

So who is God?

My Heavenly Father. The center of my logic, my heart, my passion. The why of the how. The why of the what. The man who wants to give me everything I want, so he's waiting to give me what I want most.

Take it or leave it.