God on the Go: Feeling Confused

We’re going on a fascinating journey of the mind this week as we explore the perplexing emotion of confusion. I have a fun fact to share, and says that being confused isn’t such a bad thing! So, instead of shying away from those confusing moments, embrace them… With God by our side, even the most confusing moments can lead to beautiful revelations!

What’s New!

Monday Story:

• Julie Lyles Carr confused at how kids’ treated her | Mary at the tomb of Jesus

Tuesday Key Verse:

• I Corinthians 14:33 – For God is not a God of confusion but of peace.

Wednesday Prayer:

• Lord, when I feel confused about things, help me see clearly. When I have questions about things that don’t make sense, help me feel your peace. In the name of Jesus, amen.

Thursday Question:

• What is something you feel confused about?

Friday Fun Fact:

• Q:What can help you learn something better?
• A. Feeling confused can actually help you learn better! Researchers say that not knowing the answer to something and feeling confused about it can help your brain be more open to figuring out the solution!

Show Notes:

To get this week’s episode and daily text prompts, text the word Go to 89419.
If you are in Canada, text GodOnTheGo to 866-729-1065

Transcription:

I went out to the kickball court like I did most every day. It was a game that my friends and I played when I was in elementary school and we had this red ball, kind of a burgundy red ball that we would hit against this wall, and there were certain ways you made points and there were certain things that you could do and couldn’t do, and there were rules, and all kinds of things and we loved to play kickball. It was our thing. Well, this one day I went out to play with the kids I’d been playing with for a long time, and all of a sudden it seemed like I wasn’t really welcome anymore. They were making teams and I wasn’t going to be on a team. A person I’d played with a lot wasn’t going to play with me. I walked away so confused.

I didn’t know what any of this meant. And that wasn’t the only time that I felt confused when I was in school. When I was in the fourth grade, there was a new way of teaching math that got introduced and I could not figure it out. I think my parents thought that maybe I was just being a little bit stubborn or I wasn’t trying, until I started bringing my homework home, and my mom was an accountant and my dad was a rocket scientist, and they couldn’t figure out the way that this math was being taught. We were all confused.

I’m Julie Lyles Carr, and this is God on the Go. Part of the Purposely Podcast Network where we help you make the minutes matter. We’ve been talking about emotions that don’t always get the spotlight. Feelings that we don’t talk about quite as much. It seems like to me we spend a lot of time talking about love or anger or being scared, but there are other emotions that we experience that are big. And there are emotions that we experience that we need some help sorting through, and to me, confusion is one of those emotions. Confusion can feel like a lot of things, being confused. You might not know what to do. You might feel a little afraid. You might be frustrated. All of those feelings come from the feeling of being confused. Not being sure about what you’re supposed to do or not understanding what’s going on. Like I was telling you about playing handball, and all of a sudden everything has seemed to change. So, confusion can feel not so great, but it actually can be something that’s helpful to us. I know that can sound kind of funny, but when you don’t know what’s going on, when you are unsure of what you’re supposed to do, this is really interesting.

You know what can help you learn something better? Feeling confused. Feeling confused can actually help you learn better because researchers say that not knowing the answer to something and feeling confused about it, can help your brain be more open to figuring out the solution. Now, I’ll warn you, when you’re in the middle of feeling confused, you probably aren’t thinking, wow, what a great opportunity to learn something, but it really can be. There have been several studies that have come out that show that when you feel confused, you actually may end up earning a better grade. You actually may end up learning something better because you’re having this feeling of being confused, and you know that you don’t know what to do, so your mind is open to a lot of possibilities. I think that’s a really interesting way that God puts this together.

There’s a story in the Bible that talks about someone who was confused after Jesus was crucified and they put his body into a tomb. One of his followers, one of his friends named Mary Magdalene came to the tomb a few days later, because she just wanted to have some time to cry and to be sad. But when she got there, the stone to the tomb had been rolled away and Jesus’s body wasn’t in there anymore. She was so confused. She ended up encountering someone that she thought was a gardener who came walking along, and she was saying, I need you to help me. My friend, my friend Jesus, he died and we buried him here and now his body is gone. But you know what? That gardener actually ended up being Jesus. All of a sudden she was able to see, even though she didn’t get all of it, even though she didn’t understand all of it… some of her confusion was cleared away because now she realized that somehow, some way, this friend of hers, Jesus, who she followed who she loved, well, he was alive again.

It’s an amazing story of someone going from a place of confusion to learning something that they never expected, which was that Jesus was going to come back. Absolutely incredible. It reminds me of the verse in one Corinthians 14:33 where it says,

For God is not a God of confusion but of peace.

It’s not wrong to have the emotion of feeling confused. It’s fine. God makes all of our feelings, but here’s something I love about God. He doesn’t want to leave us in a place where we feel confused all the time. He provides a way. He provides an explanation to certain things. We’re never going to know all the mysteries of God. He’s just too big and too amazing for us to ever be able to get all of it. But what he does want us to know, what he doesn’t want us to be confused about at all, is that he loves us and that he brings us peace. Even when it’s peace in the midst of feeling a little bit confused. So the next time you feel confused, look around for something new you can learn. The next time you feel confused and you start feeling a little overwhelmed, or like you might start feeling really frustrated, just take a moment and see what might be interesting or new that you’re experiencing because of this place of not having all the answers. Of not knowing exactly what’s going on.

Being confused is something that is part of being human. There are going to be times that we simply don’t know all the things that we want to know, and that’s okay. It’s so amazing to be able to say, “Huh, how am I feeling in this moment? Well, I’m feeling confused.” There’s something about being able to name the way you’re feeling that can be really helpful, even when you don’t know exactly what’s going on, even when you don’t completely understand everything. That’s okay. God is still a God of peace, and he is a God who won’t leave you confused when it comes to how much he loves you.

Hey, when you have a minute, I would love for you to text to the number 8 9 4 1 9 the word GO. That’s G O and we’ll send you lots of great stuff through that text, you’ll get memory verses and trivia questions and reminders of when episodes are coming out. It’s just a great way to stay in touch and to help make the minutes matter. I’ll see you the next time on God, on the Go.