What and When

I am in a season right now where I am more aware than ever of my need for God's guidance.  I have a lot of decisions to make and things to think about, more than it seems I ever have.  Maybe becoming a man just brings that stuff with it, and maybe I should have been feeling like this a year or two ago while I was determinedly avoiding decisions and (to be honest) real life.  Whatever the case, anything that reminds you of your dependence on God can't be too bad of a thing; it's just that the uncertainty can be unpleasant.

I don't feel afraid about it all, though... not really.  This past year has been a year of immense change and I know God has guided me through it all.  As I approach another birthday, I feel like the coming year is going to be much the same in that respect.  The hard thing about change, though, is that while you can sometimes see it coming, it's pretty much impossible to tell what it's going to be.

Really, I think that's where we get in trouble a lot in life: trying to decide what changes will come to our lives before they happen.  Even worse, sometimes we try to tell God what changes he should be making and when they should be happening.  I know I had a whole plan for my life when I was 18-- according to that plan, by this present time in my life I was supposed to be a full-time pastor happily married to the woman of my dreams and thinking about when and how many kids to have.  Thankfully, God knew I wasn't even close to ready for any of that.

Funny thing is, a lot of that horribly mistaken adolescent vision was based on things that I really do feel like God wants me to do.  My heart is to minister to people, to be married someday, and to be a good father.  I feel like these desires come from God and even honor him.  What God has been showing me recently, though, is that just because he has spoken something, doesn't mean it has to happen right NOW.

I've seen a lot of people bring themselves pain like this-- God gives them a vision for something, and then they get ahead of the plan and wear themselves out trying to make it happen, only to end up questioning God when the plan fails.  My question is, whose plan was it?  We (I include myself here) have an alarming tendency to grab the plans out of God's hands and make them our own.  God should fulfill this vision this way, and (usually) right NOW.

The Bible paints a very different picture of how God fulfills his plans, even once he has revealed them to us.  The lives of Joseph, Paul, Abraham, David, and many others reveal that God doesn't always do things right NOW.  After God revealed some of his plans to those honored individuals, they ended up being imprisoned for years, preaching on the backside of nowhere, wandering about in foreign lands, or being chased by the very king they had been anointed to replace, for example.  And Jesus, who clearly knew that God was his father at age 12 (see Luke 2:49), had eighteen more years to wait before he began his ministry!

But who would have followed a 12 year-old rabbi?

It just wouldn't work.  My point, I guess, is that any attempt at carrying out God's plans before their time is just as ludicrous.

As for those people I mentioned, all they kept on doing was the next right thing.  Joseph never lost faith in prison and served with distinction no matter where he found himself.  Paul just kept on preaching the truth. Abraham was even willing to sacrifice the son of the promise if it meant following God's commands.  Maybe part of David being a man after God's heart was the way he knew that God had anointed him king in Saul's place but continued to serve him and refused to kill him even when he had the chance (twice!).  He was waiting for God to do what he said he would, and he refused to take it into his own hands.

As for Jesus, he just continued to grow.  That's pretty incredible, considering he was God in the flesh.

Now, none of that is to say that we should just passively wait for things to happen.  All those men walked in great purpose and initiative when the time was right.  It's just to say that finding out what God wants to do is worthless if we won't wait on his timing to make it happen.  We also have to keep growing in the meantime.

So that's where I find myself.  I know God wants to do some things.  I'm just trying to find out what they are and, just as importantly, when they are.  The constant battle of life is to let God's plan be the one I follow.  This plan is not just destination, but timing and method as well.  God's revelation, no matter what it is, awaits its appointed time to be fulfilled (see Habakkuk 2:3), because God fulfills it--not us.  Jesus knew that it was his Father who was the one doing the moving.  I want to know what the Father is doing, and then (and only then) join in doing that thing myself.  That's how God's will is done. 

And if we'd all do that... that's how his kingdom will come on earth as it is in heaven.