Don’t you hate it when you tell yourself, “I will never…. ”  and then you do it? Like for instance-

“I will never gain that weight back”- 20 pounds later while sipping on a milkshake you wonder why your pants feel tight

or …

“I will never buy a red car much less a minivan”- “Ma’am this van has everything you want and at this price it won’t last long…”  SOLD!

or….

“I will never keep the puppy if I constantly have to tell you girls to take care of him”- He is four years old.. you know where I’m going here

or….

“I will never be like  ‘cough,cough’ and be hooked on some reality show”- I get sucked into the American Idol tunnel two nights a week and can hardly wait for the next week’s show…

In my defense I like American Idol for several reasons-

• Our whole family can watch it and worry very little about being surprised with foul mouths or sex talk
• You can actually see some great singers as well as unbelievably eager but not so great singers
• You can pick a favorite and watch how far they go(I actually picked one winner from his very first audition and I think I have again this year)
• My favorite reason- the stories behind the people

I love watching the stories of the people who are participating.  Sometimes it is of hardships they have overcome or sometimes it is a little something about their life that helps them stand out. Like a few years ago there was a contestant whose father was in prison and she was raised by a loving grandfather, or like this year a contestant is young but is a widower… or even another one this year, Scott, who actually went home tonight, is the first contestant to ever be on the show that has been visually impaired.  As he left tonight he was praised for his encouragement for others.  Scott’s story, shown on the big screen week after week, showed that Scott isn’t that much different from anybody else…. He lived the life that was given and was grateful for the good and worked around the inconvenient.

I think that is the great thing about faith… it has a way of turning the bad into the inconvenient.  Inconvenient is something that kind of messes up things or is that road that you really didn’t want to have to travel but it still gets you where you need to go.  Without faith, it is hard to see beyond the bad. It is in those bad times though that we are able to decipher if our faith is real… it is easy to have faith in the good times… that is the genie in the lamp kind of faith.. or then again, maybe that is not faith… our faith shows up in the dark times….faith is believing what you can’t see… yep, dark times… it is the hope in the midst of the faith that turns that bad into inconvenient.

We all have a story.  We all have traveled the road of inconvenience or darkness… some maybe even are traveling it now.  As we say goodbye to Scott this week on American Idol we can hold on to the “never” that God has promised us….

Deuteronomy 31:6

⁶ Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or terrified because of them, for the LORD your God goes with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you.”

God’s “nevers” are true…. Have faith and be blessed