Waiting...

Last year I had the opportunity to speak to a group of women and share about making God a part of their everyday lives.  I had someone come up to me in tears because she was seated at a table full of pregnant women all discussing and sharing birthing plans.  She knew me and knew how God had brought my family together.  I think God sent me that day just for her because she just needed someone to see her pregnant heart.  Her belly wasn't protruding but her heart sure was.  We talked about how difficult waiting is because we aren't always given a due date that can be counted down on our calendars.  Unlike a physical pregnancy, our hearts can be pregnant for years.

Waiting is never easy and what I have learned about myself is that I am not very good at it.  I am a take action kind of gal.  I like to accomplish things and make progress and feel like I am doing something.  And sometimes in the midst of waiting none of those things are possible. 

God has allowed me to see some new things in this current state of waiting that I have totally missed in past seasons of waiting.  The biggest one is that waiting is as much of the journey as the actual destination.  That sounds like the perfect slogan doesn't it.  I mean it sounds like something someone says to you while they are trying to be encouraging but it doesn't really help that much.  I know because that has always been my attitude.  This isn't the first time I've heard that phrase, but it is the first time I've heard it with a new understanding. 

In previous seasons of waiting, my focus has been all wrong.  I was solely focused on the finish line.  Whether it was realizing a dream that I had longed for or a job promotion or whatever, my focus and thoughts always went to living in the land of dream come true.  Not only was I living in the land, but I also romanticised it big time.  I mean my life would be complete if only this came true...blah!

See totally missed it!

It is dangerous when we live longing for the land of dream come true.  Do you know why it is dangerous?

Because we miss so much of living in the land of Right Now!

God has a plan and a purpose (Jeremiah 29:11) for every single one of our days.  This verse says nothing about the plan only coming true when we live in the land of dreams come true.   No, every single moment of every single day has purpose with God and I don't want to miss that!

This is what I am learning and let me go ahead and tell you that I am in the remedial class, I am learning that what I need to do to navigate these times of waiting is to keep my eyes solely on Jesus.  Here I go again with another slogan or great Christian saying.  Sounds like an excellent bumper sticker doesn't it.  It is so true though. 

When I focus on Him and not my circumstances, the waiting doesn't seem unbearable.  I have seen that there are many things that God needs to work out in this heart of mine.  Distractions that so easily take my eyes away from Him.  In the past, I have ran ahead of God trying to get to that land of dreams come true and guess what all my efforts were useless.  They just ran me around in circles but never helped me get there faster. 

In this time of waiting, God has allowed me to see and experience that He Is Faithful!  He has allowed me to see and experience that He Is My Provider!  He has opened my eyes to II Peter 1:3 that tells me that He has given me everything I need for life and godliness which means that when I feel like I can't that I really can because He has given me everything I need for this current season of life.  And that "everything" comes from the One that is living inside of me not from anything I can do on my own.

I encourage you today to focus on Him, not on the land of dreams come true or circumstances that seem to be insurmountable.  If you are His, you have everything you need to live in the land of Right Now and it starts with keeping your focus on the supplier of  your everything!

"Turn your eyes upon Jesus
Look full in His wonderful face
And the things of earth will grow strangely dim
In the light of His glory and grace!"