My son and I were clearing out his toy box not so long ago. A dreaded chore, but so good once you’ve cleared out of all the old, broken and random unused toys.
We found a box filled with mixed puzzle pieces, he was so excited as he poured them out onto our dining table and tried to piece them together. He started out with pure joy and excitement as he sifted through the puzzle pieces, but soon became very frustrated when the pieces wouldn’t fit together as he wanted them to.
I sat next to him, and watched him for a bit, hoping he would realize that the pieces were mixed puzzle pieces from multiple puzzles. Instead he became more frustrated that they would not fit. I then eventually said: “I can help you if you want.” Being the stubborn toddler that he is he responded with: “No, no, no I can do it, I am big boy mom!”
So, once again I sat next to him watching him try to piece all of the mixed puzzles pieces together. He dramatically threw the puzzle pieces across the table and said: “I can’t do it!” He wanted to give up there and then, and you could see he felt frustrated and disappointed in himself that he couldn’t do it, or couldn’t figure it out by himself.
I gently put my hand on his shoulder, and said: “The pieces are all mixed up, so they aren’t meant to fit.” He looked both confused but kind of relieved now knowing that it wasn’t just him, it was the mixed up pieces and he needed someone to tell him, encourage him and help him to piece it together. We then sifted through the pieces together, and grouped up the right puzzle pieces and began connecting them together to make the full picture.
Let God help with puzzle piecing
This little moment with my son reminded me that sometimes in life things don’t always “fit”, or work out like we would like them to. Sometimes we are so consumed by feeling frustrated or disappointed that it’s not working out we don’t see the bigger picture. We need to step back and allowing ourselves to sift and filter through things and group the right pieces together.
That process requires patience, wisdom, and it requires bucket loads of humility as we surrender and allow for God to help us when we get stuck. God always sees the bigger picture, He know hows the “puzzle” needs to look in completeness. God knows exactly what pieces we need to make things fit beautifully as He designed them to be.
If you are feeling frustrated with the season that you are in, or disappointed because you just can’t piece it together by yourself, then may I encourage you to reach out to God to help. He can show you how to piece every little piece together in the right place, that will add to your beautiful bigger picture.
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