photo above courtesy of bing
My mom used to always tell us, you always show people your appreciation – she would always give people gifts when she met them for the first time, so I sort of picked that up from her and wanted to do the same for him, I mean after all – if he was paying, the least I could do was show a token of my appreciation by having the tip and a gift. As I pulled up to the restaurant, I noticed that the car he was driving two nights before was not there yet and it was okay, I mean I was 10min early…
I decided not to sit in the car but to go inside and sit in the lobby and wait on him, in which I felt like should have been pulling up at any time now. As I sat there I watched the various people come in and out of the restaurant all the while piercing my eyes through the glass window to watch the parking lot of any sight of his car. I played on my phone, checked my Instagram – scrolled through a couple of quotes all while keeping an eye on the parking lot.
When I looked at the time, it was 15min after – okay, I said. Maybe he got caught in traffic, overslept or just forgot – I mean, I didn’t have a number to call and check the matter either; so that made things even more annoying. 15min turned into 30, 30min turned into 45, 45min turned into an hour. Soon, the people that walked in before me and/or after me was beginning to come out of the restaurant – each with puzzled looks on their faces as if to say “You’re still here?” in fact, one woman just came out and asked “Weren’t you sitting here when we went in?” Yes, ma’am I said with a fake smile – this whole scenario was beginning to be embarrassing as well as sad.
I began to text my friends and tell them how the guy never showed up, they all were encouraging and thought maybe something happened and maybe he couldn’t get there to tell me. All the while I was thinking “How could a good conversation with someone a couple nights ago, lead to them standing you up?” I couldn’t wrap my head around it – but I began to think about the prayer that I prayed to God. I told one of my friends that maybe this was God’s way of protecting me from something that I didn’t need to get into – I mean, he is omniscient and can see further than our eyes ever will. The only thing I knew was that I didn’t want that day to go wasted; one of my friends wasn’t having it, she love seafood and asked could she be my date for the evening – she literally dropped everything and came. So the day didn’t end bad although I was puzzled and a little sad about how the situation turned out, I knew God had his hand in it and my best interest at heart and I thanked him for keeping me from whatever it was, that I didn’t see. Plus, we ate some good fried fish ya’ll…..lol
A COUPLE DAYS LATER…..
I met up with an acquaintance to help her out with a couple of social media issues, but needed to go to the store….AGAIN!….I started to go before my meeting but thought that I would go after as I didn’t expect us to be long. When I left her, I went to Wal-Mart; once I entered the parking lot I parked in front of this elderly woman whom was on the phone, I quickly glanced her – got out and went into the store.
As I came out of the store and got closer to my car – I heard this woman mumbling something about a guy having friends, there was this child with her – her car was now parked in front of me, I looked at them and proceeded to get into my car, When I got into the car and put my keys into the ignition, I looked up and low and behold – guess who was sitting in the passenger seat of the car the woman parked in front of me got out of….THE GUY THAT STOOD ME UP! For a moment I paused and started to just leave, but I couldn’t – I got out of the car and just stood there looking at him – he was asleep but as he shuffled around in his seat, his eyes came open and he looked right at me. (He looked like he had just seen Casper the ghost!!)
He gave me this stupid look and grin and got out of the car….”Hey, how you doing” he said. I was still standing there looking at him at this point. Nervously, he was fiddling around like he was looking for a fix….as he headed from the passenger side of the car to the back door of the driver side, he said “Hey, what you doing this weekend; you busy?” Really???? Dude???? Like, I’m the same woman that you stood up this past weekend!! Did he actually think, I was stupid enough to go out with him again to get a double whammy of what he served UP? The Nerve! As he made his way back around to the front of the car, now looking towards the stores door. I asked “What happened to you Saturday?” with his head down and kicking at his shoe to get the packed mud off – he said “Something came up” and literally turned around and walked towards the store….no explanation, no I’m sorry, no nothing….(then had the audacity to look back, Oh……if I had a HUGE ROCK!! the place in which I would aim it!)
While I was in utter SHOCK of his response! In that moment, God showed me what he was ALL about and I was so happy and relieved about that. He didn’t want me to get into a mess and he really did have my best interest at heart all because I chose to place the situation at his feet in the beginning and the WILL it had for my life. It also let me know that I need to stick to my guns and stay single this year as I had proposed in the beginning.
While this was guidance for a relationship for me, you may have issues or things going on in which you need to put on the altar before God and let him make the final decision on if it’s a YES or if it’s a NO! I know it’s hard to let go and ask God about our life especially when we so badly want to steer it in our own direction but let this story be proof that God really does want the best for you. Whether it’s a job, car, house or spouse; let God have the last say……Your pockets, mind, sanity and heart will thank you later.
Roshonda N. Blackmon – Creator of A Blog, A Magazine. It’s JustsumInspiration, Author, Speaker & Encourager
Did you miss Part 1 of this story?, You can read it here
Finish reading the last series of “I Will Wait Until God Says, It’s My Time!” do you think Bernice will finally through in the towel and let God handle it? Or will she keep trying and trying and failing……Check out the ending of this series on Thursday 2/22/18
A Blog, A Magazine. It's JustsumInspiration! 
This question was answered perfectly by the blogger, but it got me to thinking. “How many other people feel this way”, “How many other people are there that really have a desire to walk in holiness and be a good christian but miserably fail at it; anytime they get up to do the right thing – it seems like they trip and fall every time. So, while the question above was answered, this is my answer to anyone else whom may struggle on a daily to be fully committed to God. (see below)
We all have times in which we want to give God our everything but for some reason while that’s our hearts desire, the temptations of life seem to always get in the way of us fulfilling what our heart wants and that’s to be closer to God. The Apostle Paul said, (paraphrasing)….Every time I want to do good, Evil seems to always be there too. Romans 7:21
We have to understand that when we have a mind to want to please God, the enemy is going to always be there, to make sure that we don’t fall through with our choice. His job is to always bring distractions and destruction to our path, anything he can use to make you discouraged in fully trusting and/or believing in God. But there’s a secret to overpowering his deception, and it’s this “Your will for wanting to serve God has to be stronger than your struggle not too” – meaning, You have to fight your way through your decisions and/or struggles to fully rely on God and it’s not going to be easy.
When the enemy sees that your will is stronger than anything he’s throwing your way? Then he’ll leave you alone for a season…because he’ll have to step back and figure out where your new weakness lies. We have to be consistent, that’s where our true power resides….In consistency. The enemy fights us where we’re weak, if one minute you’re in and the next minute you’re not, then that also means you’re double minded, and the bible says in James 1:8 “A double minded man is unstable in all his ways” constantly wavering between doing right and not doing right is a breading ground for the enemy.
If he can keep you confused and perplexed about your walk with Christ, then he’ll continually keep throwing things in your path to keep you that way. Another thing you have to keep in mind is this, because this is my thought process when it comes to the enemy “He doesn’t really have that much power, we give him the power to do things. The enemy has to go and bow down before Christ, just to ask him a question about us” So, if he was sooooo powerful and mighty – then why does he still have to bow down, you know why? Because he recognizes that God is ALL powerful and the ruler of the Universe, he also knows that God is over him – he can’t do anything unless he gets permission from God to do it. God is all his love and glory, brags about you and tells the enemy that you won’t fail or fall for his tactics, he speaks highly of us. So when the enemy tempts us and we fall or fail…..he laughs and tells God “See, what I tell you” but God, like any Father or parent believes so highly in us, he knows that next time – we he’ll be the last one laughing. I know what I said may sound sort of juvenile but I want you to know that God wants you to succeed and never wants you to fail. You can see that here: