Making Tough Calls

Discernment: it’s the one spiritual practice most of us engage in on a daily basis.

Big and little decisions alike: we often stop, consider the options and seek to make thoughtful choices.

Do I have lunch with this friend or do I stay at home and work in the garden?

Do I make a 3-hour one-way trip to visit my family this weekend or do I stay at home?

Do I take all my vacation before the end of the year or store it up for later?

We discern the deeper stuff too.

Do I seek to re-connect with my estranged friend or just let the relationship go?

Do I bring up that topic with my spouse I’ve long never said aloud or do I just keep to myself?

Do I start looking for a new job that brings me greater joy or do I just manage what I’ve got?

Though we may try to use our most thoughtful and reasonable processing skills when it comes to future plans and activities, there are times when you and I just don’t know what to do.

We simply do not know what we should pursue next.

And in this “unknowing” we put so much pressure on ourselves to find the one right path or make the one right decision.

But is that even possible?

Thomas Merton, spiritual teacher and Trappist monk wrote in Thoughts from Solitude this prayer that I keep coming back to over and over again in my life:

My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going.
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so.
But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you.
And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing.
I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.
And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it. Therefore will I trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death.
I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.

I believe that Merton’s prayer gets this very truth: God and life is a mystery.

There is never just one right way.

Even if we think we’re making the best decisions after hours of pro and con charts or quiet moments of prayer, we might not be!

I really want to throw the towel at Merton at this juncture because I’d like to know that I've got more of a say in how my life unfolded.

My internal protest sounds a lot like this: doesn’t my intellect count for something? Doesn’t my careful weighing of choice A or choice B get me somewhere good? Doesn’t my years of service some how get me to the front of the “knowing God’s will” line?

But the thing is: it doesn’t.

As much as we think we know, we really don’t. And often years of residence on this planet don’t get us anywhere either.

Sounds depressing, but . . .

But if you are a person of faith, I have to tell you this: there’s always hope, even through the murkiest waters of life.

Nothing we do can separate us from God’s love.

God’s sea of forgiveness is vast and deep!

And most of all: no matter what, God promised never to leave us.

So because of this hope, let us stop trying so hard to make the tough calls alone.

Let us embrace the freedom that grace offers us.

Let us do the best we can, but then just allow the great mystery of God to do what we cannot: lead us toward a good future.