Trusting the pattern

The first time you try to knit cable stitch (which I know you are all itching to do) you read the pattern, use the strange two ended needle and a couple of rows into the design you wonder what on earth you are doing - it looks messy, it does not make sense. Then, if you are patient, four or five rows later your despair begins to lift as you see that you have done it right, and there is a discernable pattern in your work.


For this reason I often find patterns difficult, having to hold on to see that it is coming out right can be hard. Why am I doing this this way, I ask myself - after all sometimes it seems counter-intuitive. But if I hold on I have usually got it right, and done things the way that they should be done. Perhaps, I reason to myself, if I used more patterns they would become more natural to me, and the seemingly strange requests they make would have a more obvious outcome and not just use my faith to think that my efforts will come out anything like the picture on the front.

I do not believe that we often get a photo of the finished goods from God - more often we know what we have to do and even how we ought to do it but we worry ourselves into inaction. Faith is a strange thing and God weaves some intricate designs on us. Often it is only time and patience which will allow us to look back on our labors and say,
"Aha, now I see it!"