The older I get, the more I realize that there is nothing I want outside of the will of God. As I’ve heard before, having everything without God is nothing while having God plus nothing else is everything.
I can’t imagine life without God. Instead of owning stuff, my stuff would own me. I’d be a slave to my fears and my lusts and never know true joy. I’d always be the same broken and miserable person from day to day without any hope of change.
I’m learning that the best place to be is smack dab in the middle of God’s will. I can dream of some pretty wild scenarios, but no one out-dreams God. His plans for me and for the world are so much bigger and better than anything my puny mind can conceive or comprehend.
So I wait and I trust. I keep reciting the first part of the Lord’s prayer where it says, “Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” I pray that even if it means that my will be undone, as Elisabeth Elliott used to pray all the time.
I’d rather have my will undone than to get my heart’s desire and be undone by it. I know how people are destroyed by fame and fortune without the grounding to handle that kind of success. I know even the severe mercies of God are better than the praises of men and the rewards of a life apart from God.
So it’s God’s will. Nothing more. Nothing less. Nothing else. Period.
“It’s not about how the worship music makes us feel on Sunday morning, but how we live poured-out lives of worship from Monday to Saturday.
It’s not about how many verses we can quote to defend our political viewpoints, but how well we embody the Word made flesh to our politically opposite next-door neighbors.
It’s not about how pious our prayers sound during Sunday School, but how our hearts hear the whisper of God both in our hidden rooms and in our lived-out interactions with others” (Asheritah Ciuciu).
Now that we’re past the dreaded elections (or at least they were for me), we can hopefully return to normal. We can hopefully reach out across party lines to embrace and love those who voted differently than we did. We can understand that there is room in the Kingdom of God for blue and red (as well as many other colors).
The point is that we’re called to love our enemies, period. It doesn’t say to love them if they show remorse for their bad behavior. It doesn’t say to love them if they promise to reform. It says to love them the way Jesus loved those who crucified Him. And how did He do that? He forgave them. He died for them.
We’re also called to honor our leaders, according to Romans 13. That doesn’t mean only those who share my political ideology. It doesn’t mean those we like and admire and can respect. Remember when Paul wrote those words, the ruler was Nero, who was just about as bad and corrupt as they come. Nero was responsible for the martyring of many followers of Jesus. But Paul said to honor him because God in His infinite purposes sets up rulers, good and bad, to accomplish His will.
Ultimately, it helps to remember that we’re all broken. The problem isn’t just out there. We all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God and can share the blame for the problems of this country. We would be wise to drop those stones we want to throw at the Trumps and Harrises of the world and their followers unless we can prove that we’re sinless.
If we live out of love as citizens of a Kingdom more than of a country, we do well. Our ultimate allegiance isn’t to any president or to any flag or any political party or ideology. It’s to a King and a Kingdom. It’s to Jesus who will still be on His throne long after all the presidents and kings and emperors are long gone.
I think if I had to sum up my life to this point, it would be something like this: if you keep showing up every day with hope and expectation in God, no matter what each day looks like, God will show up big time.
If you keep on keeping on even when it would be easier to quit, then you find out that God hasn’t and can’t and won’t ever quit on you.
Even if all you have is that mustard seed amount of faith, it’s enough, because it’s not about the size of your faith but the size of your God.
Many times, I’ve found that God worked through me when I was not aware of it. In fact, most of the time God used me when I thought all I was doing was showing up and serving in the best way I knew how. I may never know until eternity how something I said or did changed another’s life forever.
If I can, you can. All you need is to keep showing up to your life knowing that God will more than meet you halfway. Your greatest moments may not be preaching to thousands or writing the hit songs or representing Jesus on the world stage. In fact, you may be completely unaware of your impact in this life.
But I know God honors those who honor Him. God rewards those who keep seeking and serving Him, even when they’d rather be somewhere else doing something else.
God can take the two fish and five loaves of your life and break it and multiply it to minister to the multitudes. You might not see the leftover baskets on this side of heaven, but trust me that they are there.
My life may not have gone according to plan, but that’s okay. It’s going according to God’s plan, and that’s way better.
“Even if today didn’t go as planned, Lord and if it’s not at all what we hoped, and if “we’re* not yet quite what we hoped, and if life’s not unfolding to our Plan A and if it’s not even close to Plan B and if the diagnosis is not great and if the forecast is not good and if not… and if not… and if not… You still are. You still are Good & You still are God. And we will be the people who will still… The people who will still rest in it & sing it into the dark: ‘and if not — He is still Good. He is still God… so we can still & be & be at rest.’” #HonestPrayers” (Ann Voskamp).
Even if today didn’t go as planned. Or this week. Or this month. Or even this year (cue the Friends theme song).
“Having Christian convictions can’t ever negate having Christ’s compassion” (Ann Voskamp).
It’s not a case of either/or. It’s both.
In today’s culture, there are those on one side who let their compassion override their convictions. They preach tolerance (except for those who happen to disagree with them) and teach that loving people means loving their sin.
On the other side of the fence, there are people whose convictions have turned them into people who not only need to be proven right but everyone else must have their faces rubbed in the fact that they’re wrong.
If you truly follow Jesus, you’ll have both. Jesus said to the woman caught in adultery “Neither do I condemn you” with compassion, but He also told her “Go and sin no more” with conviction. Yes, Jesus loved sinners and ate with tax collectors and prostitutes, but He loved them into repentance and transformation. When He ascended into heaven, they weren’t sinners, tax collectors, and prostitutes anymore. They were devoted disciples living a new way of justice and holiness.
Remember, it’s not either/or. It’s both/and. God was compassionate toward you while you were a sinner far from grace but He still calls you through conviction to repent and turn to Jesus in faith.
“It will be said on that day, ‘Behold, this is our God; we have waited for him, that he might save us. This is the Lord; we have waited for him; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation'” (Isaiah 25:9, ESV).
[Verse 3] A fountain for the thirsty A lover for the lonely This is our God And He brings glory to the humble And crowns for the faithful This is our God
[Chorus 1]
[Chorus 2]
[Bridge] Oh Lord You are the one we have waited for You are the one we have waited for So You are the one we have waited for
[Chorus 1]
[Outro] You are the one, You are the one There is none like You, Jesus There is none like You, Jesus” (Chris Tomlin / Jesse Pryor Reeves).
One day, our faith will be made sight, then we will proclaim that this is the God we’ve been waiting for all these years. We will declare the ultimate and final victory then.
This is the same God we’re waiting on and worshipping now.
I was listening to an 80s Truth record I picked up recently. I got to the song Homesick. It sounded vaguely familiar, but I felt I had heard or read the lyrics before very recently. Then I remembered I had seen a post with the very same song lyrics less than a week ago.
The song is the heartbeat of any believer who knows this world isn’t really home. A former pastor of mine once compared this life to a very nice, very clean bus station (or airport terminal, if you will). It’s not supposed to be your forever place to live, but a place to be until you can get to your forever home.
“They say home is where the heart is And I’m finding out it’s true ‘Cause I long to be in heaven Since my heart is there with You Reading over letters That You’ve written to me Telling me of all You have in store Makes me start to dreaming Of the place I want to be And I get that lonely feeling Like so many times before
I get homesick Longing for my home And for Your open arms Of lovе and comfort Waiting for me there I gеt homesick Yearning for my home And for the day When all Your family Gets together forever Our eternal home sweet home
Lord, You living truth within me Keeps me safe and warm All its strength and all its beauty Rise through every storm Without its presence in my soul I could not carry on To face the many battles I find here Lord, you keep the promises I build my life upon And as time goes by, I know That I will always keep them near
I get homesick Longing for my home And for Your open arms Of love and comfort Waiting for me there I get homesick Yearning for my home And for the day When all Your family Gets together forever Our eternal home sweet home” (Larry Bryant, Lesa Bryant & Justin Peters).
It’s interesting to be homesick for a home we’ve never known, but that’s what it is. That’s why nothing here will ever completely satisfy the deep longing of our souls. Only God can do that. And our experience of God here is cloudy and partial. One day it will be clear and complete. We will know as we are fully known. And we will be truly home.
I’ve never thought about it that way before. I suppose it could be a bit of a stretch to make a connection between waiting on God and working at a restaurant, but it works. When you wait tables at a restaurant, you wait for people to make up their minds on the menu. You wait on the kitchen to prepare the food for you to take to the tables. You wait on the people to finish their meals before you present them with the check.
But it’s not a passive waiting. The whole time, you’re serving. You’re bringing baskets of bread and drink refills. You’re always available to take food back to the kitchen if it’s not cooked right or if it’s the wrong order. You’re never sitting still while you’re waiting.
I think the same applies for waiting on God. Typically, God has revealed something to you that you then need to apply. In Hebrew, hearing and obeying come from the same word. In other words, you can’t hear from God apart from doing what He said. Part of waiting is obedience.
I think part of waiting is also making yourself ready to be used the moment God calls for you. That means you don’t have distractions or detours to keep you from responding to God’s call. As I mentioned before, maturity is the distance between God’s call and your ability to obey. Waiting is where you narrow that gap.
May we learn to wait well. May we learn to worship in the waiting as loudly as after the waiting is over, to sing the same way in the hallway as when we get to where God opens the door to the fulfillment of His promises. Then the waiting will have been worth it.
It’s easy to be intimidated and discouraged by the size of the mountain, isn’t it? Real mountains can be a pain, but those metaphorical mountains can seem impossible to overcome.
I was reading recently about Mount Everest and all those who have attempted the climb and died in the effort. They thought they were smart enough, strong enough, tough enough, etc., but the mountain proved to be too much.
Some obstacles in your life can seem like that. When you look ahead, all you can see is that mountain in the way. There’s no way around it or under it or over it. The thought of climbing it fills your heart with dread and fear.
But remember that every mountain has a maker. Jesus said that if we had enough faith, we could say to the mountain, be cast into the sea and it would obey. Basically, Jesus said that it’s not big faith that gets past the mountain but faith in a big God.
So don’t look at the mountain, but cast your eyes on the One who can move that mountain. Talk to the One who has already overcome all of death, hell, and the grave. What is it that you’re facing that is stronger than what Jesus has already overcome?
Mountains are scary, but remember that the taller the mountain, the better the testimony at the end.
“… just slipping a note to those in the thick of it who really need to know right now how this all works out, how today ends, how this week ends, how this whole shebang ends:
SPOILER: GOD WINS” (Ann Voskamp).
“No doubt about it! God is good— good to good people, good to the good-hearted. But I nearly missed it, missed seeing his goodness. I was looking the other way, looking up to the people At the top, envying the wicked who have it made, Who have nothing to worry about, not a care in the whole wide world.
Pretentious with arrogance, they wear the latest fashions in violence, Pampered and overfed, decked out in silk bows of silliness. They jeer, using words to kill; they bully their way with words. They’re full of hot air, loudmouths disturbing the peace. People actually listen to them—can you believe it? Like thirsty puppies, they lap up their words.
What’s going on here? Is God out to lunch? Nobody’s tending the store. The wicked get by with everything; they have it made, piling up riches. I’ve been stupid to play by the rules; what has it gotten me? A long run of bad luck, that’s what— a slap in the face every time I walk out the door.
If I’d have given in and talked like this, I would have betrayed your dear children. Still, when I tried to figure it out, all I got was a splitting headache . . . Until I entered the sanctuary of God. Then I saw the whole picture: The slippery road you’ve put them on, with a final crash in a ditch of delusions. In the blink of an eye, disaster! A blind curve in the dark, and—nightmare! We wake up and rub our eyes. . . . Nothing. There’s nothing to them. And there never was” (Psalm 73:1-20, The Message).
It’s easy to lose sight of the end when you’re stuck in the middle. When evil seems to rule the day, it’s hard to believe that God can ever set things right. It’s tempting to fall into a cynical view of “Well, that’s it. We’re done for. There’s no hope left.”
But just as Billy Graham said, I’ve read the last page of the Bible and I know it’s going to be fine in the end. Actually, more than just fine. It will be better than the happiest ending in the best book you’ve ever read. It will be like in the last book in the Narnia series where all that happened before was merely the title page and prologue, but heaven is where the real story starts and where each chapter is better than the one before.
The Bible says for those who are in Christ that whatever the worst that we can face is light and momentary compared to the joy that’s coming. Read that again. The absolute worst we can imagine ever facing is light and momentary compared to the joy that awaits.
Not that what we face isn’t very real and very scary and very awful. But the joy ahead is infinitely greater and longer and lasting. It will be like the joy of a new mother holding her child after the pain of delivery, knowing it was way more than worth it.
It will be way more than worth it when we get there.
