God's Purpose in Our Struggles
One of the guiding scriptures that God brought me to when I was first developing my coaching business is Psalm 139:14. “I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made…” This verse reminds me that everyone who comes to me for coaching is a child of God, made in His image, for His good purposes. No matter the mistakes a person makes, everyone is cherished by God, unique, and perfect in His presence. And it is my job to view people this way, too.
Recently, though, my belief in this truth has been shaken. At 13 months, my daughter was diagnosed with a speech delay. My perfect, precious, vibrant daughter was struggling to learn to talk to us, and I wanted to believe that it wasn’t happening.
You see, I know in my head what God had been trying to teach me about what it means to be “fearfully and wonderfully made.” I know that He is a perfect being who is creating people who will live in an imperfect world. I know that this means that we have no chance to be perfect as long as we live on Earth. This knowledge allows me to offer compassion and empathy to other imperfect people. However, I sometimes struggle to acknowledge when these worldly imperfections are present in my life. This makes it hard to remember that God actually uses these struggles and imperfections to accomplish His purposes for our lives. So, at first, I couldn’t fully apply this verse to my daughter’s struggles. Instead, I prayed every day that God would teach my daughter to talk, no matter what. I cried out to Him daily, filled with grief that she couldn’t share her thoughts and with anxiety that maybe she never would. Please understand, there is nothing wrong with crying out to God for what you want. In fact, He invites us to do exactly that in Philippians 4:6 when He writes “do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.” God wants to hear us share our desires with Him! However, I was missing something important that God is trying to teach me: He has a purpose and a plan for my daughter’s struggle. I don’t know yet what that purpose is, but I am learning to trust that God’s process is just as valuable as His answer to my prayer.