Discernment

Discernment: the ability to judge well.  Perception in the absence of judgment with a view to obtaining spiritual direction and understanding.

If you would ask my dad what discernment means, he would say... It's that fork in the road.  I have heard that many times while growing up.  And, he's right.

Discernment can be tough, real rough.  Sometimes a decision is quick and easy, but other times it's real hard to know what to do.

 There's an old adage..."Father knows best."  Many and probably most times, my earthly father absolutely does know what's best.  He has that "been there, done that" notch on his belt.  He's been down that particular road before.  He speaks from experience.  This includes my mother too, I might add.  Being a wife and mother of nine, I've had some "been there, done that" moments of advice myself.

As I travel into my past, I had many times that I did follow my parent's advice, but of course, sometimes I didn't.  If my memory serves me right, that usually led to regret. If I only would have listened.  Luckily for me, those times were few.

One decision of my past that I thank God for every day, is to have all of my children.  The best decision Nick and I could ever had made.  Being open to what God wanted to do with our family.  His way, not ours.

Whew!  It was close though.  With all the pressures of this day to not have children, it was a close call. Nick even at times had co-workers chase him around work with a scissor!  I don't even want to imagine what we would have missed if we had followed the crowd.

The beginning of our marriage wasn't so open, but we were able to correct our course before it was too late.  A change that affected the course of history itself, not only ours.  One day I mentioned to my dad how if Nick and I during our marriage did everything else wrong, at least by having our children we did something right.  He added... "And you changed the world."  Wow, how neat is that.

 I have to give my mother much credit.  She gave me materials about the evils of contraception, "Humane Vitae" written by the Pope and much more to contradict this only two-child, if any children society we live in.  Thank God for my mother.  She definately knew best.

One thing in life we can be absolutely sure of, is our Heavenly Father and Mother always know what's best.  The problem sometimes is what is our Father saying to us?  Are we understanding Him?  It can at times be tough.  We want to hear Him clearly. So we can make the right decision and not have lingering regrets.

Discernment takes lots of prayer.  We need to search out His will in our lives.  We are to not make rash decisions and take everything before Him.  Now, just to practice that.  I can't say I always have, but I can say I have improved.  I know that pleases Him.  At least I try, and when I fail I keep on trying.  What more can we do?

If we make it a point to walk daily, step by step with Him, without jumping ahead, He will surely lead us to our eternal purpose and reward.  Our best reward ever, an eternity to be with and love Him... forever.

We just have to watch that darn fork in the road.