When the Pieces Don't Fit

     I read somewhere that our brains are like the muscles of our body. We have to exercise them or they turn to mush. There are almost limitless ways to keep this mushiness from happening. Some turn to crossword puzzles. Eh, not for me. Others turn to adventure video games. Still, others turn to Sudoku. If you don’t know what that means I can’t help you.

Our brain strengthening strategy has included puzzles. We like some of them more than others. Puzzles that have large sections with one pattern and color are annoying. I like nature scenes, personally. If we finish the puzzle we step back with a sense of accomplishment. Some of us should feel it more since not all of us worked on it as long. 

There are other kinds of puzzles that can be just as, if not more difficult to solve. We don’t need a quarantine to know that the events and challenges of our lives don’t always seem to fit what we’ve been taught. When we read our Bibles, for instance, we see that Jesus says, “I will never leave you, nor forsake you.” (Mt. 28:20). Yet, there are occasions where we feel desperately alone. If our Savior is there in those moments it seems he must be hiding very well. That’s the way it feels to me, anyway.

Sometimes we wonder why we have been made the way God made us. Some of you may feel like you don’t fit in your family or school. You feel like that piece of the puzzle that made its way into the wrong box. Teenagers, as well as adults, can easily convince themselves that they would be much happier in a different puzzle. There are those of us who think the puzzle we are in won’t amount to much. So, we get restless and speak negatively to those around us about our puzzle. Why do we do this? I think it’s true that misery loves company. But, if we have to make other people feel uncomfortable belonging to a puzzle to feel companionship we have not really loved them. We have been selfish.

What about the times when loved ones get sick? What about when we face health trials? What if we feel ugly? What if your prayers aren’t answered? The Bible says, “Ask and it will be given unto you, seek and you shall find, knock and the door will be opened unto you.” And “Whatever you ask for, in my name, it will be given to you.” What do you do when you’ve prayed and prayed that the pain would stop—but it doesn’t. What about when your parents just won’t stop fighting and they wonder why you want to wear noise-canceling headphones as you walk around the house? These pieces just don't seem to make sense. They don't fit.

Perhaps the worst cases are the ones where we know exactly where we fit in the puzzle and we just don’t want to be placed there. We can tell that fitting where we are designed to fit will not bring comfort, but pain. It will not bring popularity, but ridicule and a sense of deep deep loneliness. The Bible has a metaphor for it: “The valley of the shadow of death.” David knew such valleys. His life must have been very puzzling to him. He was the anointed king of Israel, but he was forced to hide in caves to keep from getting murdered. He could have tried to recut the puzzle of his life so it made sense, but he trusted that God had a plan and placed him in a puzzle that was confusing at the time, but just right in hindsight. 

Jesus knew what puzzle he chose to fit in. He said that he came “to seek and to save the lost.” Isaiah said he would be “a man of sorrows.” I can picture him in the garden the night he was betrayed. The puzzle was almost complete. Our Lord was not puzzled. He knew how the pieces needed to fit together. Yet, he was reluctant as he prayed. He asked for the puzzle to remain unfinished but found strength in envisioning the completed puzzle. “For the joy set before him, he endured the cross, despising its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.”

Jesus knows how to arrange the pieces of the puzzle of your life. All the things that don’t make sense; Jesus knows where those pieces fit. He designed the box lid that you can’t see. He knows what the completed picture will look like before you even have two pieces linked together. The question is, will you trust him?

“For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans for a hope and a future.”   —Jeremiah 29:11