Decisions But Not Deciding

“The Lord decided what a person will do; no one understands what his life is all about.”  Proverbs 20:24

All the grief literature and advice states not to make any major decisions the first year following a death.  Well, the major decision was already made when death entered my life, and I began the grief journey.  I did not choose for death to take away my hopes and dreams.  I made no decision to make my life different.  I made no decision to change all of my relationships.  I did not decide.  But the decision was made.  Life was given so many days on this earth, and now the days were complete.  Decision were made about life and I did not get a choice.  Is this your story, too?

Life involves decision after decision.  We decide what to wear, what to eat, where to go, what career, who to marry, where to live and the list goes on and on.  How do we learn to make these decisions?  Some are made without our input like who our parents are and where we are born.  So who made these decisions for our lives?  For me, I recognize the existence of God and God’s ultimate decision to create and sustain life.  We choose to believe or not to believe, but that choice does not determine God’s existence, just one’s belief system.

The greatest decision of my life was to accept Jesus Christ as my Lord and Savior and surrender my life to God’s will and direction for my life.  I professed my faith publicly as a teenage and have spent my life trying to follow God’s will.  I have made plenty of decisions outside God’s will and boundary for my life.  I have accepted the consequences of the sins and asked for forgiveness.  The desire to make our own decisions is part of the human desire to be in control and not have any boundaries.  This usually leads us down a selfish and sinful path of pain and hurt.  But pain and hurt also occur when we surrender to God’s will and follow His path of life.  So if life is going to be hurtful, why not make our own decisions about what pain we want to endure?  Sounds like a good idea, but the problem is we do not get to make the decisions about all the people whom we are in relationship.  The pain and grief of death is not our choice or decision.

Death has occurred, and the only decision I get to make is how I face it and live in this different life.  In the cloudiness and numbness of our grief, decisions seem to be made around us without a conscious awareness of actually deciding.  It seems things happen, and we have no memory of how it happened.  Other times, we know we must decide the next step but wonder how to figure out the process.  For some of us, we never made a decision by ourselves.  It was always with our partner, always with someone we trusted to guide and direct the process.

In my grief journey, I decided to move five times.  The first decision was made from necessity of downsizing and dealing with changes in our lives.  The other moves were about finding my life in this different world and who I am now.  I would probably change some of these decisions as I reflect, but I learned from each one of them and continue to learn in my choices and decisions.  Decisions can be huge like a move or small like getting out of bed.  Sometimes we need to just let things happen because deciding is too overwhelming.  

Now that we are alone, we accept that God is our strength, guide, and comforter on this journey.  We may question why God allowed death to occur when life was not completed.  We need God’s peace and protection, but we struggle with whether God’s decisions for our lives will again bring pain and hurt like the loss of our loved one.  This surrender to God’s will and decisions for my life have been a continual process of trust and growth.  I know God loves me and wants to live in my heart and be the center of my life.  When I decide to trust God, I let go of the need to make every decision my way.  I decide to believe God wants the best for me even though sometimes it does not feel like it.  It is deciding to follow God even when I cannot see the path ahead of me.  It is deciding that I do not need to make decisions for the future, just trust my future to God.  It is knowing that I will still feel loss, pain, hurt and heartache but deciding I will still love even though it may bring these feelings.  It is deciding I do not need to decide, but to live in the moment and hold Jesus’ hand.  It is deciding to have faith – trust in the One who now holds my hand.