"The Chosen Path"

The Chosen Path - By Kathryn Lay

“The path of the just is like the shining sun, that shines ever brighter unto the perfect day.” ~ Proverbs 4:18

Never before had I ever attended such a large memorial service for someone. So many people had turned out to mourn the loss and celebrate the life of my dear friend Linda.

As I sat in the pew, my emotions struggled with the sorrow of losing a special friend, the pain I felt for her husband and four young children, and the horror I felt for her three-year battle against cancer. Yet as I sat there listening to the service, I was blessed by hearing of her strength, her love for God, and trust in Him, her care and concern for others in the midst of her pain and fear, and her ability to have planned and written this amazing memorial.

The pastor said something I will never forget: “Linda often said how God had blessed her by teaching her so much through this time. Although she would not have chosen to go down this path, she thanked Him for what this time gave her in her walk with Him, and the quality time she spent with her friends and family.”

I shivered at the thought. How could my friend have thanked God for leadin her down such a devastating path that ended in ther death and separation from her husband and children?
What if God asked me to do something like that – something more difficult than I ever thought I could handle? Yet from painful experience, I knew He asks us to trust Him even when life doesn’t make sense and our hearts are bruised and battered.

But what if there were two paths from which to choose? What if Linda had beaten her cancer? What if she had never had cancer at all and been allowed to live a full life? If she had known beforehand that she would grow so much closer to God and her family through the cancer, which path would she have chosen? What path would I choose?

If made me think of my own journey with God. Fifteen years ago, my husband and I decided it was time to start a family after we’d been married for two years. He had finished college and begun his first teaching job, and we were ready. Getting pregnant was the next step on the golden path we planned to walk.

Time went by. Ten years, in fact. Ten years of disappointing pregnancy results, a false pregnancy, painful treatments, jealousy of our friends who were having children, and emotional pain that left us angry and bitter. We prayed and begged God to give us a child, to make us a family. I felt defective and set-apart from other women- terrified that God’s plans for us might include leaving us childless.

Then six years ago, through my friend Linda who so recently had died, we were shown a way to adopt a child who had been neglected, abandoned, or abused. Because of Linda’s friendship, baby Michelle came into our lives at nine months old, healthy and happy. I thought about our little girl and the two paths idea. Suppose God had given my husband and me a choice during our time of struggling with infertility and said, “Years down the road, you will adopt a loving, special little girl who will bring you great joy, or, you can have three birth children in the next five years.” My choice would have been to have those three biological children. My patience wouldn’t have waited for the promised daughter. I would never have chosen to go through those childless years and then spend another year in classes and being probed and prodded about our lives by strangers.

But I would never go back and change the circumstances. I can’t imagine life without my daughter, or the things she’s taught us, or the experiences we have gone through as adoptive parents. My prayers would have taken me down an easier path, but God chose a more difficult and fulfilling one for us. Yet, how can I compare the painful death of my friend to the glorious adoption of my daughter? Only in that Linda and I both came to a crossroads where we had to accept God’s will for our lives and conquer our fear.

Would I have chosen such a difficult road for my husband and me to become parents or for my friend’s painful death and sure passage into Heaven? No, because I could only see the steps in front of me. I couldn’t see around God’s curves. My fear was of the unknown future.
Thankfully, God doesn’t always ask me to choose. Instead, He sets me on the path best followed and gives me the strength to walk it, asking me to hold His hand and trust Him even when I’m afraid. The future is in His hands.