The Beauty of Grace when God takes His Time

Have you ever just felt a surge of inspiration from God? A sudden uplifting in your soul even though nothing has really physically changed? I had been feeling so down about so many things the past couple of weeks. I had gotten caught up in pursuing dreams that I just could not force into fruition. And I lamented that maybe I had heard God wrong, that maybe what I thought He had put on my heart was not what He meant.

I had a conversation with a dear friend and mentor of mine last night. I had asked her advice on something that I knew only she could help me with. She spoke from experience as she guided me through the next steps that she recommended I take. And I kept thinking, “Praise God for this friend!”. She wasn’t telling me that the road was going to be easy, and she wasn’t giving me some secret short cut to bypass the hard road, but she spoke the truth and she spoke God’s Grace in the process. While she was explaining the difficulties of obtaining my goal, I realized that although I had been desperately searching for a way in and was dreaming about overnight success, the truth was that I was hungry for fulfillment in the work of God. Often times the work of God comes without a pay check and it comes without overnight celebrity status. The work of God doesn’t always happen in an instant. While it can, many times that is not how God chooses to work because God chooses to work in ways that will produce the most beautiful end result…and always, always, this takes time. Even when God instantly healed people in the Bible, or instantly calmed the storm, there was a lifetime leading up to it…there were relationships formed first…there was a backstory to what God was doing.

It is so easy to get caught up in the “what am I doing for God” and lose sight of the “what is God doing for me right now”.  I want to encourage you today as I have been encouraged. God gives us dreams, and He plants things deep in our hearts that only He can make grow. We are only the seed.

Our God is the God of eternity. His timeline just keeps going on and on and on. We live in a world that thrives on instant gratification. We have smart phones, and texting, and the internet, and we hardly have to wait for anything. I’ve been wondering lately if all this instant gratification has led to a lower appreciation, a lower satisfaction, and an avoidance of contentment in my life. Maybe the reason I hate to wait for things is because I have completely forgotten how to wait in the first place.

But throughout the Bible this is what God asks of His people, to wait, and to know with the waiting comes the revealing of beautiful things. His people waited for a Savior, Abraham waited for a child, the Israelite people waited to enter the promised land, Jesus waited three days before rising from the dead, and we are now waiting for the return of our Savior. And in all of these things, God’s Grace and His unfailing Goodness has been proven over and over again.

Psalm 27:13-14 “I am still confident of this; I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord.

Being faithful in waiting is what God has called us all to do. God is not our smartphones. He doesn’t reply to text messages the instant you send them. He is not scrolling through social media every second of the day because He is afraid He will miss replying to something the second it’s posted. No, God is better than all of those things. His time is being better spent. The things that take time are often the things that are most precious to us, they are the things that last. They are the things we pour our hearts and our souls into. And they are the things that we are most grateful for in the end.

If God has asked you to wait on something, know that He is actively allowing time to create a beautiful Grace in your life. He makes us stronger in the waiting, and He makes the end goal so much more beautiful when He finally reveals the final product.

Rejoice in the wait today my dear friends. Know that God has not forgotten your story, He is simply perfecting it. Your life is worth more than the instant gratification of this fast paced world. It deserves to have more time spent on it. It deserves to bask in Grace for awhile. The answers to your prayers may feel like a long time coming, but they are so worth the time being put it into them. He hears you…He values you…and You are worth the time. Know that the answers to your prayers are also worth the wait. Hold tight friend, beautiful things are coming.

1 Peter 5:6-7 “Humble yourselves, therefore, under God’s mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time. Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.”

My friend by the way is Michelle Johnson, author of God Loves You Circle and Scriptures and Scones. She has the kindest soul and God is so beautifully using her for His kingdom. If you’re looking for some early stocking stuffers or just a new devotional maybe you could click on these links and check hers out? (She doesn’t know I’m plugging for her right now but I totally love her and know you will too.)

Scriptures and Scones by Michelle Johnson    God Loves You Circle by Michelle Johnson