Nothing Goes Wasted

Have you ever tried so hard to make something work and it still failed?

You put your heart, sweat, and tears into it and…nothing. As hard as you tried, as many books as you read, as much as you prayed, and as long as you fasted, the thing that you wanted to work out simply didn’t.

I think back to the defeat I felt after I quit my first adult job like it was yesterday. A few weeks into working as a teaching assistant, I quickly realized how ill-equipped I was to effectively support the needs of my students.

But quitting wasn’t an option because that would mean the sacrifices my parents made to put me through college were in vain. That would mean I was letting down my students.

That would mean I was a failure.

So I stayed and held tight to God’s promise to be with me. I showed up every day and tried to give my best to the bright-eyed third graders staring back at me. Yet unfulfilled, anxious, and exhausted, I went home and cried every night before bed until one day I no longer recognized the person I saw in the mirror.

To make a long story short, I finally quit after seven months and it felt like I wasted seven critical months that I could've used to launch my career forward. The shame was unbearable and at the time it felt like the biggest setback I’d ever experienced.

Naturally, when you’ve invested your time, gifts, energy, and emotions you expect to reap something. So when I felt like I came out of that experience with nothing I was devastated.

All I could do was present my heavy heart and empty hands to God.

But as I look back, I can finally see that my hands weren’t empty at all. Though I lost a lot, I left with crumbs.

Those crumbs were the truths, revelations, and lessons that primed me for the next two years of my life:

• I learned how to worship on my worst days.

• I learned how much grit I have.

• I learned to identify signs of burnout.

• I learned how damaging my people-pleasing tendencies are.

• I learned that it’s okay to let things fall apart sometimes.

• I learned that God doesn’t call me to die on every hill.

Even though I felt immense shame after quitting that job, the first time made it easier for me to leave the next one. It gave me the strength, wisdom, and gall to take ownership of my career and recognize when a place no longer aligns with my future.

Looking around at where I am now, made me realize how resourceful God truly is and how resourceful He has always been in my life.

That wasn’t the first time God made something out of the little I had left. God used my first heartbreak to expose the part of my heart that craved validation. He drew me closer to Him than ever before and reminded me of my God-given identity.

My first friend breakup led me to reexamine the kind of friend I was and truly experience the purity of a friendship with Jesus.

When my car broke down shortly after I bought it (and a thousand times after that) God provided each time and I learned to be a better steward of my finances.

So if you’re feeling depleted because of a job you gave years of your life to, a degree you didn’t end up using or completing, a relationship or friendship you gave way too much of yourself to, or something else, know this:

God does not waste anything that you surrender to Him. He can make use of the little you have left.

I don’t say any of this to minimize the very real pain that comes after you feel like you poured and lost. I know the feeling too well. I say this to tell you that there is nothing you go through that God is not capable of using.

Our losses, “failures,” and shortcomings set the perfect scene for us to take stock of what's left and what’s next. Every single setback is an opportunity for God to refine, strengthen, and reposition us, provided that we let Him.

You may have just exited a taxing situation and feel like you’ve lost a piece of yourself, I get it. I've been there and I'm still there when I think about some of my past mistakes.

But time and time again, God proves to me that nothing will be wasted. No tear. No heartache. No setback. No dollar amount. He can use it all.

So take a look at your hands. What do you have left?

Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight. Proverbs 3:5-6

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