In the Waiting

Yes...I am alive!  I've had blog ideas stuck in my head but just haven't sat down to chew on them enough to get them on here.  What I have to say today has nothing to do with my previous ideas, it's about what's going on in my head today. 

We all have seasons that we go through and we could all come up with a title for them.  The season I am in at the moment can be summed up with the work "waiting".  Not much glamorous about that, huh?  Maybe not.  However, I have known for a while now that God's desire for me is to "Be still and know that He is God".  Last night it occurred to me that it's in these moments and seasons of "stillness" that things are really happening behind the scenes.  We are not in a culture that does well with waiting and to be honest...I'm part of that culture.  I don't like to wait.  Whether I like it or not, it's what I'm doing.  I don't know how long this season will be, so, I can either be miserable, or I can embrace the truth that God is never still.  WE don't see what's going on, we might not FEEL that there are things going on...but God is always at work and I'm thankful that I'm one of His projects. 

Haylee loves it when I tell her stories of when she was a baby.  She loves stories about when I was little.  She loves stories, period.  She's been asking me questions about when Brian and I got married and in one of our conversations I must have told her that I had to wait for Brian.  (my time frame was about 12 years premature of God's time frame)  She asked me tonight to tell her about how I waiting for Brian when I was little.  I told her that I didn't know daddy when I was little.  She reminded me that I had told her that God made me wait for daddy.  I had told her that I asked God for a husband because I wanted to be married and God said "no, not yet".  I said, "Please, God....can I have  a husband now?"  God said "not yet, you're not ready".  (of course I relay this a little more entertaining for Haylee)  I told her that I finally told God, "OK, I'll wait.  Bring me a husband when you're ready".  Little did I know that God was waiting on ME to be ready.  I was antsy for a husband for 12 years before I got one.  Funny thing, it was in the waiting that I grew and matured enough to actually handle what I'd been asking for.  If you would have asked me at the time I would have told you that there wasn't much going on...but there was everything going on.  God never requires us to wait for something for nothing.  Rest in knowing that there is always a reason....and it is GOOD.  Thank GOD I didn't get married any sooner than I did.  I can only imagine where I would be today if I would have forced what i wasn't prepared for.

I'm doing a Beth Moore bible study about the book of James.  Interesting that the lesson tonight was all about waiting.  the title of the lesson was "between the rains".  You see, in the Bible it talks about how important the rains were.  They didn't get a lot of it...so the spring and the autumn rains were imperative for the crops and the people relied on that precious rain. 
There are times in our life when we are blessed with the rain we pray for and long for and need....and there are the times between the rain when we are forced to be still and wait.  The best part of the lesson was the verse Hosea 6:3 which says "Let us acknowledge the LORD; let us press on to acknowledge him.  As surely as the sun rises, he will appear; he will come to us like the winter rains, like the spring rains that water the earth."

Beth Moore has such a gift with words and the way she can impact so many with her use of them.  She explained that as long as that sun rises our rain is coming.  That is a promise.  I needed that promise. We are never forgotten and we also are never alone in our waiting.  We have our Savior by our side, we have friends to walk beside us and to pray for us.  We all have seasons, and whether yours is a rainy one or a dry one, isn't it wonderful that we are never in any season alone?   

I might not need my umbrella for a while, but I'm holding on to it because I know that healing precious rain is coming.  God promised, and I will wait.