Who else would I go to?

As I was driving to work this morning I was praying. The car might be my favorite place to pray. I kind of consider it God and my personal meeting space. And with hands-free calling devices, I don't even have to look crazy. My fellow drivers may think I'm just chatting on the phone, when in reality I'm pouring my heart out to God. The crying and dramatic hand motions might give me away. Wow, this is embarrassing.

Anyway. When I was praying this morning I kept thinking of the verse in one of the Gospels where Peter says to Jesus (this was the paraphrase in my mind), "Who else can we go to? You are God!".

Lately (and by "lately" I mean "all my life") I have been struggling with the Unknown. I capitalize "Unknown" because it is a formidable force in my life. I do not in any way like the Unknown. I like to know. Unfortunately for myself lots of life is unknown. In fact, most of life is unknown. So, in lieu of having the power to know all things, I tend to jump to conclusions. It works beautifully. I say that very sarcastically.

I think it is also called making assumptions. I am uncomfortable with not knowing what someone is thinking or how things are going to end up, so I come to my own conclusions and then read into tiny details in order to confirm my previously made conclusions. Lovely.

And crazy. Because often my jumped-to conclusions and assumptions are wrong, wrong, wrong. God has demonstrated this to me powerfully in the past week. Things that I had no way of knowing came to light and I couldn't help but think that God knew the entire time. While I was lamenting and writhing and planning and concluding, He KNEW the entire time.

I love coming to the end of myself. It saddens me that it has to occur over and over again, but it doesn't lessen the sweetness. I love coming before God and saying, "You are God. I am not. You know everything. I know so, so little. I desperately need to cling to You because You are the only thing I know for sure". Which reminded me of Peter's remark, "Who else would we go to???".

Imagine my surprise and pleasure when I started reading through the Gospel reading for today's Morning Prayer and saw this:

Because of this many of his disciples turned back and no longer went about with him. So Jesus asked the twelve, "Do you also wish to go away?" Simon Peter answered him, "Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God." (John 66-68).