Often parents would come to my principal’s office at ISK (International School of Kabul), requesting their child have a particular teacher, certain they knew which one would be the right one, and make for a wonderful school year for their precious student. Sometimes they feared an unknown new hire arriving to replace a departing teacher and they wanted a familiar face. Sometimes it was because a sibling had encountered issues or favor with a particular instructor, and they wanted the next child to avoid or experience that teacher again. 

The parents wanted every year to be perfect as an expression of love (or control?) for their child.  

I ended up describing to parents what I called the funnel effect. I explained that each nine months of learning for their child may not be the best, or the worst, but would merge to be a positive overall educational foundation. Their child would learn life wisdom as well as academic knowledge by being taught by a wide variety of individuals, not perfect, but all able to impart seeds of information that could be used to build a quality life. 

We are like that in our lives too. In every situation we want what we think will work out best for us. And why not? Seems reasonable and yet… 

The truth is, just as we cannot arrange the perfect school year for each of our children, we cannot know, let alone arrange for perfect scenarios for every aspect of our lives. Furthermore, God doesn’t come close to promising us only good things. In Romans 8 we see God is saying he will work all things out to our good, like the 12-14 years of schooling, our vast life experiences mixing together in the funnel to come out good. 

This is a great, freeing promise for those who love God. We don’t have to worry that each moment of our lives must be good to evidence God’s presence, His transforming power in our lives. Rather, we determine to learn life’s lessons and let Him work it out for our good.