It was about this time two years ago that I thought I had it made. I had been out of college for almost a year and was loving the post-grad life. I had an amazing group of friends that I got to hang out with all the time. The holidays were coming up, which is my favorite time of year. And on top of all of that, I had landed my dream job. I’m talking about the kind of dream job that made me genuinely love waking up at 5 a.m. and going to work every morning. I was getting to do things I was skilled at and passionate about. I had an amazing team that felt like family. I worked for an incredible boss, and I got to share an office with one of my best friends. I felt like I had finally ended up where God wanted me to be.

Getting there hadn’t been easy, though. I had to transfer colleges. I worked two other internships that helped me realize what fields I didn’t want to pursue, which ultimately led me to this dream job. It was everything I’d been looking for and everything I’d been praying for. And I truly believed God had led me straight there.

But one day in November, all of that changed. My boss came into my office, shut the door and let me know that my contract was being eliminated. I had one more month before I would have to find a different job. He ensured me I had done nothing wrong, and that I had always been an exceptional employee. The decision was made above his head, but none of that made me feel better. Before I could say anything, the tears started falling.

I felt confused, frustrated, hurt, angry...you name it, I felt it. I kept crying the whole way home, and all I could do was ask God, “Why?”

I was so confident that He had put me in this position for a reason. He had given me the skills to do this job well. He had given me influence and the opportunity to make a difference. So why was He taking something away that He had given me so graciously? None of it made any sense.

Weeks went by before I came to grips with the fact that God had to have had a reason to shut this door, or more like slam it. I still didn’t understand why, but He was helping me learn to trust Him regardless. It’s like when you were a little kid, and you asked your parents for something, and they'd tell you no, but they wouldn't give you a reason why they were saying no. You'd get annoyed and frustrated and probably pitch a fit because you just wanted to know why you couldn’t have what you wanted. But that didn’t make a difference, because they knew even if they told you why, you still wouldn’t understand.

God is our Heavenly Father, and He does the exact same thing as a parent. He knows we won’t always understand why He does the things He does, but He asks us to trust Him anyways. Unfortunately, that’s way easier said than done.

I’m sure you’ve felt this way before. Maybe, like me, you felt like you’d landed your dream job, only to go into work one day and get let go out of nowhere. Maybe you were an athlete with incredible talent, only to have a major injury rob you of your ability to play the game you love. Or maybe you were in a relationship where you thought he was “the one”, only to realize things between the two of you weren’t going to work out after all. We’ve all had this feeling in some way, shape or form. We believe God has given us something or called us to something, and then all of a sudden that gift, that dream, that person is taken away from us. It’s a confusing place to be, but you don’t have to stay confused.

Our God is a God you can be confident in, a God you can trust wholeheartedly. Even if your life seems to be spiraling out of control, He is still in complete control. Nothing that happens to you ever catches Him by surprise.

I don’t know about you, but when things don’t seem to be going my way, when I realize I can’t control my circumstances, I like to know that there’s someone in my corner I can trust. Dealing with hard times is bad enough, but dealing with hard times alone is even worse. So why don’t we start trusting the One who promises to never leave us? Who promises that He has a purpose and a plan for our lives? And who promises to work all things together for the good of those who love Him?

A few months after I lost my dream job, God graciously revealed the reason why. My entire team ended up being disbanded and assigned to different departments. My boss wouldn’t have been my boss anymore, and my best friend that I shared an office with ended up quitting because she was so miserable.There’s no way I could have seen that coming, but God saw it all along. He protected me from what would have been a much more painful and difficult situation. He let me down easy, and I understand now what I wouldn’t have been able to understand at that time.

So, whether you’ve lost a job, a dream, a loved one or something else, our God is still worth trusting. He is still faithful. He is still in control, and He still has a purpose for you, even if you can’t see it right now. I can promise you that believing those things is your best bet as you’re navigating through the difficult and unexpected circumstances in your life right now. And I can promise you that you will never, ever regret trusting God, even when life doesn’t make sense.