The concept of waiting has been popping up a lot for me lately, and the Christmas season reinforces it all the more. Both commercially and spiritually.
I think there is something here that God doesn’t want us to miss. There is something significant about waiting. It certainly comes up in the Bible. The Israelites waited 40 years to enter the promised land. Jacob waited seven years to marry Rachel. There are numerous Psalms about waiting, the list goes on. More significantly, God’s people waited centuries for a promised Messiah, and now as Christians we wait for Christ’s return.
One thing about waiting, is that you really can’t wait without hope. So the real challenge becomes, what are we putting our hope in? It is very easy to want to put our hope in something tangible and earthly, it’s also easy to focus on the end result, and not what God wants to do in us while we are waiting. The great thing about God is that while He certainly always has His ultimate glory in mind, He also in a very personal way understands our needs, and wants to meet them.
We just have to trust His timing. Although there are moments along the journey when His timing doesn’t line up for me and the way I see it, it always ends up perfectly.
I recently finished a Bible study with my small group, and was searching personally for something else to do next. I had wanted to find something that focused on Christmas, but didn’t know exactly where to look, and as there wasn’t a whole lot of time before Christmas, I didn’t want it to be too long. I finally scrapped the Christmas idea and decided to order Beth Moore’s Jesus: 90 Days with the One and Only. I started it on December 20th… In God’s really cool way, it happened to start with Christ’s birth… So I’ve been diving into Christmas themes after all. When I finished up this morning, I was so excited, that I just had to take a sneak peak at what I was going to be studying tomorrow. It’s centered around God’s purpose in the Christmas story, and the first question is “What has God shown you in your own life about His timing?… His perfect timing?” I’m just in awe of how God has timed my starting of this study, and how much more thrilling that I’m going to be unpacking the concept of His perfect timing tomorrow. I can hardly wait for morning, so I can do tomorrow’s study!
That’s just one simple way, that God is reminding me of His perfect timing. I think He knows that I needed a little encouragement to trust his timing in other things. Isn’t God good!
I hope that if you are in a season of waiting, that you will be encouraged as well this Christmas. I also hope that you have people to be spending the next few days with!
MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!!
I can’t sleep tonight… it’s winter… outside and in my soul.
And everything in time and under heaven
Finally falls asleep
Wrapped in blankets white
All creation, shivers underneath
And still I notice you when branches crack
And in my breath on frosted glass
Even now in death you open doors for life to enter
You are Winter- Nicole Nordeman
If the leaves had not been let go to fall and wither, if the tree had not consented to be a skeleton for many months, there would be no new life rising, no bud, no flower, no fruit, no seed, no regeneration.
So it was with our little kernal of possibility. So small, but buried. And I asked God to water it, there in its darkness, and transform the dead thing into fruit. What fruit will He bring forth? If only it could be that from so small a seed He might create the fruits of the Spirit in me, even just the beginning of learning of them: love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance.
- Elizabeth Elliot
Lord, help me to see you in Winter. Help me to not waste this season, but to see the value of it, and to patiently await the arrival of Spring.
Well, it’s officially post-thanksgiving, which means it is the Christmas season. I officially listened to Christmas music for the first time today. I really like two Christmas CD’s in particular, because I worship to them more so than any other Christmas music I listen to. They are done in a very worship oriented style, and could easily be used in a weekend service.
They are “Christmas In the Vineyard” and “Humble King: Christmas Around the World”. I highly recommend them. The first one is out of print, but you can still find it online.
Hope you are beginning to enjoy the Christmas season. May our hearts be focused on Christ.
Ok, you have to read this book! Searching for God Knows What by Donald Miller. It’s great. I’m a little over halfway through it. Kind of a psychological explanation of the gospel. Taking it from formulas to something that can connect with your heart. It takes a look at people and our motives, and how God fits into the mix. It’s really kicking my tail about what I try to grasp for in life in my quest to find value. Really, you need to read this book. You’ll like it. Here is one quote:
“I began to slowly realize that the God of the Bible, not the God of formulas and bullet points that some have turned the Bible into, but the God of the actual Bible, the old one before we learned to read it like a self-help book, had a great deal to say to me. What I mean by this is the God of the Bible, for that matter the Bible itself, started making sense of my deepest emotions, quirks, and sense of brokeness.”
I could list a whole bunch more, but it’s a borrowed book, so I haven’t been marking in it. I think that quote stuck out to me, because it’s what this book is about - realizing that God can make sense of everything going on inside of us, and isn’t that a great thing to realize. That God can identify with all of that internal stuff!?
My women’s small group is going through the book “Walking by Faith: Lessons Learned in the Dark” by Jennifer Rothschild right now. It is a great study! God has been speaking to my heart so much through this study, lovingly prodding me to trust him more, even when things don’t make sense. I highly recommend it. Here are some quotes that I’ve underlined:
“Don’t ever bow to your feelings because you hold them in such high regard, instead make them bow to God.”
“In a frenzied, futile attempt to stay in control, I held in a death grip the only thing I felt I could control. Don’t we all do this?”
“Part of learning to follow is flying the white flag of surrender. We surrender to the position in which God has placed us, and we surrender our behavior in that position.”
“My problem on the backseat of a tandem bike wasn’t my lack of control; it was my unwillingness to yield my desire for control. “
These are just things that she’s said that resonated with me in my own faith journey right now. I try so hard to be in control, and I let my feelings dictate far too much. Really great study, go get it.