Defeating Disappointments
One of the most important keys to living your best life now, as well as moving forward into the great future God has for you, is learning how to overcome the disappointments in life. Because disappointment can pose such formidable obstacles to letting go of the past, you need to be sure you have dealt with this area before taking the next step to living at your full potential.
Let’s be honest; all of us face disappointments from time to time. No matter how much faith you have or how good of a person you are, sooner or later, something (or somebody!) will shake your faith to its foundations. It may be something simple, such as not getting that promotion you really hoped for; not dosing the big sale that you worked on so hard; not qualifying for a loan to buy that house that you really wanted. Or, it may be something more serious—a marriage relationship falling apart, the death of a loved one, or an incurable, debilitating illness. Whatever it is, that disappointment possesses the potential to derail you and wreck your faith. That’s why it is vital that you recognize in advance that disappointments will come, and that you learn how to stay on track and deal with them when they do.
Often, defeating disappointments and letting go of the past are the flip sides of the same coin, especially when you are disappointed in yourself. When you do something wrong, don’t hold on to it and bear yourself up about it. Admit it, seek forgiveness, and move on. Be quick to let go of your mistakes and failures, hurts, pains, and sins.
The disappointments that disturb us the most, however, are usually those caused by other people. Many individuals who have been hurt by others are missing out on their new beginnings because they keep reopening old wounds. But no matter what we have gone through, no matter how unfair it was, or how disappointed we were, we must release it and let it go.
Somebody may have walked out on you. Somebody may have done you a great wrong. You may have prayed fervently for a loved one’s life to be saved, yet your loved one died. Leave that with God and go on with your life. The Bible says, “The secret things belong to God.” Leave them there.
Disappointments almost always accompany setbacks. When you suffer loss, of course you will feel strong emotions. Nobody expects you to be an impenetrable rock or an inaccessible island in the sea. Not even God expects you to be so tough that you simply ignore the disappointments in life, shrugging them off as though you are impervious to pain. No, when we experience failure or loss, it’s natural to feel remorse or sorrow. That’s the way God made us. If you lose your job, most likely you are going to experience a strong sense of disappointment. If you go through a broken relationship, that’s going to hurt. If you’ve ever lost a loved one, there’s a time of grieving, a time of sorrow. That is normal and to be expected.
But if you are still grieving and feeling sorrow over a disappointment that took place a year or more ago, something is wrong! You are hindering your future. You must make a decision that you are going to move on. It won’t happen automatically. You will have to rise up and say, “I don’t care how hard this is, I don’t care how disappointed I am, I’m not going to let this get the best of me. I’m moving on with my life.”
The enemy loves to deceive us into wallowing in self-pity, fretting, feeling sorry for ourselves, or having a chip on our shoulders. “Why did this happen to me? God must not love me. He doesn’t answer my prayers. Why did my marriage end in divorce? Why did my business not succeed? Why did I lose my loved one? Why didn’t things work out in my life?”
Such questions may be valid, and may even be helpful to consider for a season, but after that, quit wasting your time trying to figure out something that you can’t change. You can’t unscramble eggs. What’s done is done, let the past be the past and go on. So you’ve suffered some setbacks; you didn’t get what you were praying about; things didn’t go your way. Friend, you are not alone. Many fine, upstanding individuals have experienced something similar.
Backup Plans
Let’s be frank; sometimes, because of wrong choices, disobedience, or sin, we miss out on God’s “Plan A.” The good news is, God has a “Plan B,” a “Plan C.,” and whatever it takes to get us to His final destination for our lives.
Worse yet, maybe you weren’t the person who made the bad choices, but somebody else’s foolish decisions caused you to experience wrenching heartache and pain. Regardless, you must stop dwelling on it. Let the past be the past. Forgive the person who caused you the trouble and start afresh right where you are today. If you continue to dwell on those past disappointments, you will block God’s blessings in your life today. It’s simply not worth it.
The prophet Samuel suffered a horrible disappointment in his relationship with the first king of Israel, a man named Saul. As a young man, Saul was humble and shy.Then, at God’s direction, Samuel picked him out of the crowd and declared him to be the king of Israel. Samuel did his best to help Saul be a king who was pleasing unto God.
Unfortunately Saul refused to live in obedience to God, and God eventually rejected him as the king. Imagine how Samuel must have felt. Maybe you’ve invested a lot of time, effort, money, emotion, and energy in a relationship; you did your best to make it work out. But for some reason, things got off course, and now you feel as though you have been robbed.
That’s how Samuel must have felt. Devastated. Heartbroken. Disappointed. But as Samuel was nursing his wounded heart, God asked him an important question: “Samuel, how long are you going to mourn over Saul?” God is asking us similar questions today: “How long are you going to mourn over that failed relationship? How long are you going to mourn over your broken dreams?” That’s the problem with excessive mourning. When we focus on our disappointments, we stop God from bringing fresh new blessings into our lives.
God went on to tell Samuel, “Fill up your horn with oil and be on your way. I’m sending you to the house of Jesse for I have chosen one of his sons to be the new king.”In other words, God said, “Samuel, if you will quit mourning and get going, I’ll show you a new, better beginning.”
Remember, God always has another plan. Yes, Saul was God’s first choice, but when Saul wouldn’t walk in obedience, God didn’t say, “well, Samuel, I’m so sorry. Saul blew it and that ruins everything.” No, God always can come up with another plan. If you will stop feeling sorry for yourself and, instead, do what the Bible says, your future can be brighter than ever.
Notice what God told Samuel to do: Fill your horn with oil. Have a fresh new attitude. Put a smile on your face. Get the spring back in your step and be on your way.
Samuel could have said, “God, I just can’t do this. I’m too heartbroken. I gave so much of myself in that relationship and now it’s gone, wasted.”
But if Samuel would not have trusted God at that point, he might have missed King David, one of the greatest kings in the Bible. Similarly if we wallow in our disappointments, we risk missing out on the new things God wants to do in our lives. It’s time to get up and get going. God has another plan for you. And it is better than you can imagine!
My sister Lisa and her husband, Kevin, tried for years to have a baby, but Lisa could not conceive. She and Kevin longed to have a child, so Lisa tried all sorts of medical procedures, enduring a long, drawn-out process that included several operations, all to no avail. Finally her doctor said, “Lisa, let’s try one more surgery. Hopefullythis time it will help you to get pregnant.” So she went through that, and she and Kevin tried for another year or so, but she still couldn’t conceive.
At the end of that process, Lisa was exhausted, emotionally and physically drained. She went back to the doctor one more time to see if there was any possibility of her becoming pregnant, and the doctor offered no hope. “Lisa, I hate to tell you this,” he said, “but we’ve done everything we can possibly do. You’re just not going to be able to have a child.”
Lisa was heartbroken. She thought, God, we’ve endured all this time and effort. We tried so hard. We prayed and believed. We spent all this money. God, it’s all such a waste. It seems so unfair.
Sometimes we don’t understand why certain things don’t work out. I can’t tell you why one person is healed and another person is not, when they are both praying and believing and standing in faith. But we must get to that point where we trust God, even when we don’t understand Him. Some things we shouldn’t even try to figure out; we should let them alone and go on. God is in control. The Bible says, “God’s ways are higher and better than our ways.” God knows what He is doing. He knows what is best for us. And God always has another plan. If you’ll quit dwelling on your disappointments, God will show you what the plan is.
That’s exactly what Kevin and Lisa did. They finally came to the point where they said, “God, we’re putting this totally in Your hands. We’ve done everything we know to do. Yes, we’re disappointed, but we’re not going to be trapped in the past. We’re going to move on with our lives, knowing You are in control. You are a good God, andYou have good things in store for us.”
A few months later, they received a telephone call from a dear friend of ours, Nancy Alcorn. Nancy is the founder and president of Mercy Ministries of America, a ministry that takes care of young women at risk, including those dealing with premarital pregnancies. When a young woman gives birth to a baby and wishes to give up the child for adoption, Mercy Ministries helps place that child with a loving Christian husband and wife.
“Lisa, I don’t even know why I’m calling you,” Nancy said. “I normally would not do this, but we have a teenager who is about to give birth to twin girls, and we were just wondering if you and Kevin might be interested in adopting them? It may not work out, though. I know you and Kevin have all the other qualifications, but one of the birth mother’s stipulations is that her baby be placed in a family with twins in their background.”
Little did Nancy know that Kevin, Lisa’s husband, has a twin sister, and it was always his dream that he would one day raise twins. God answered the specific prayer of a young lady giving up her baby for adoption, while fulfilling a dream of Kevin’s and Lisa’s at the same time! A few months later, Lisa and Kevin were able to adopt, at childbirth, two beautiful baby girls. God had another plan!
But if Lisa had not been willing to let go of her own plan, if she had not been willing to get over her disappointments, I don’t believe God’s new plan would have opened up for her and Kevin.
Maybe you have put a lot of time, effort, and resources into your plan. You’ve prayed about it; you have believed. Maybe you have spent a lot of money. But now you can clearly see that the door is closing, and you are disappointed. You say, “God, how can I ever let go of this? It’s going to be such a waste. I put so much into it, and all I can see is failure.”
Right there is where you must dare to trust God, knowing that He has another plan, a better plan. He wants to do something new in your life. And you must let go of the old so you will be ready and able to receive the new plan God has for you. God will do more than you can even ask or think.
Recently, Kevin and Lisa adopted another child, a baby boy Lisa quipped, “How about that! God has given me three beautiful children, and I have not had to spend a single month being pregnant!”
We all encounter circumstances that can cause us to grow negative, bitter, or disappointed with ourselves or God. But I love what the apostle Paul said: “Forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal.” In other words, Paul was saying, “I’m not going to dwell on yesterday’s disappointments or my past failures. I’m not going to think about what I would have done or should have done. I’m leaving all that behind, and I’m looking ahead for the good things God has in store for me.” That’s the kind of attitude we should have as well.
Every morning when you get up, refuse to dwell on what you did wrong the day before. Refuse to dwell on yesterday’s disappointments. Get up each day knowing that God is a loving and forgiving God, and He has great things in store for you.
Paul said, “I’m straining forward. I press toward the mark.” Those words imply a strong effort. It’s not always easy to get over some of those humps in the road, those disillusionments and disappointments. It’s going to take a strong will. Sometimes, it may take courage; sometimes nothing but faith in God and sheer determination will see you through. But you can say, “I refuse to be trapped in the past. I’m not going to let the past destroy my future. I’m pressing on. I’m straining forward, knowing that God has great things in store for me.”
When you make mistakes—and we all do—humble yourself and receive God’s forgiveness and mercy Be willing to forgive yourself. Don’t live in regret. Regret will only interfere with your faith. Faith must always be a present-tense reality, not a distant memory God will turn those disappointments around. He will take your scars and turn them into stars for His glory.
