Category: waiting

While You Wait
Prayer · waiting

While You Wait

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We expect fast service. Fast delivery. Fast answers to our text messages, and, let’s be honest, we expect fast answers to our prayers. But we quickly learn that God’s time table is different than ours, and we often find ourselves waiting. Today’s podcast answers the question – What should we do while we wait for God to answer our petition? You might be surprised that we aren’t supposed to be just sitting still and doing nothing! Find out what you can and should be doing while you wait as you listen to today’s episode that concludes the series on Elizabeth.

You can listen to a preview here ~

Continue reading “While You Wait” →
Lessons In Waiting
trials · trust · waiting

Lessons In Waiting

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mountain a

Yesterday I had the joy of spending the day with my daughter, Whitney.  She was accompanying her refereeing husband to a Lacrosse game and it was close enough to me that I decided to drive over and spend her waiting hours with her.  It was a great day of mom and daughter shopping, having lunch, oh, and of course we watched the lacrosse game, too (well part of it!)!

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On our way back to the school after our shopping excursion, I was dropping her off at the stadium where she would wait while Paul reffed one more game, and I would head back home.  The traffic in this little town was backed waaaay up and Whitney commented to me,

“Maybe you could find an alternate route so you could miss this traffic and not have to sit and wait.”

I opted to stay my course and it wasn’t that bad after all!  But her comment made me think about this post I was getting ready to write.  Don’t we all eagerly look for ways to divert waiting? 

At Chick-Fil-A we look for the shortest line.
We make doctor appointments at the times of day when the doctor will be less likely to be backed up.
We use the Scan and Go app at Sam’s club and the on-line pick-up at the grocery store.
We text so we don’t have to wait for someone to answer our call.
We slide into scheduled events right on time or shortly after so we don’t have to sit.
And yes, we take alternate routes so we don’t sit in traffic.

But when it comes to waiting for God to move in on a situation or end a trial, our hands are completely tied.  There is nothing to do but wait.

Such was the case in our Two-year wait for our grandson’s adoption. Our daughter and son-in-law did all they could to help the process go through by fulfilling their responsibilities, but we could not hurry the process in any way at all.  But praise the Lord, after two full years, the waiting is now over and those boys bear their parent’s name!  The judge made it official and we could not be happier!!

I sat down after the adoption day and wrote out the things the Lord has taught me while we waited and watched our grandsons go through the adoption process.  These were lessons I didn’t want to forget.  While they’re fresh on my heart, I want to share them with you, too.

  1. My spiritual adoption made me forever God’s child. 
    1. I was weak and sickly.
    2. I was needy
    3. I was already connected to earthly things
    4. My spiritual adoption was costly
    5. There were witnesses – the angels in heaven!
    6. I’m secure forever as God’s child
    7. God pursued me in love
    8. There was a plan
    9. I now call God Abba Father
    10. I have all the rights and privileges of a full-grown son!
      So now…
  2. We can trust a sovereign God with the desires He puts in our hearts.  God had put in our daughter’s heart the longing for a child, and she longed to adopt!  God didn’t give her one child…He gave her TWO!!
  3. While waiting for God’s plan to unfold, faithfully and diligently do now what He has called you to do.  Alli learned this lesson and shared it with me.  While she was waiting, she said God prompted her heart to be a faithful wife and homemaker.  She got busy taking care of her husband and their home.  One day after feverishly deep cleaning her house, they got the call from the social worker about two boys that needed a home.  Weeks in the NICU with them, and becoming a mom of twin sons kept her so busy in the weeks to come, she had no time to think about deep cleaning!!  Her faithfulness while she waited truly paid off once God brought about His plan for their family!
  4. God’s timing is perfect!  We know this in our head, but when we watch Him answer and provide and we turn around and look behind us at the path we’ve walked, we see that the timing of it all couldn’t have been better!  We see how amazingly it all worked out!
  5. He is at work even when we cannot see the evidence of it. There were so many days that it seemed we were getting nowhere, but all along the way, God was opening the path and providing the best way possible for our whole family.
  6. When we allow God to work, He gets the glory because we had nothing to do with it!  There is no way we could have worked all these details out, and we clearly see that the Lord did it all.
    On that Adoption Day, we stopped in that courtroom and my husband led in prayer, thanking God for all He had brought to pass.  We praise Him for His love, provision and care for us and those two precious boys that we love so much.

Now, I ask you, What are you waiting for right now?  What answer, what provision, what completion, what need is staring YOU in the face as the adoption did us?  Please read again these six points and remind yourself that if you have been adopted into God’s family, all these truths apply to you right now, too.  Why not stop right now and ask God to help you to trust Him to bring about what is necessary, and to increase your faith as you, too, learn these precious lessons while you’re waiting.

The adopted daughter of the King,

denise a

Christian Life · trials · waiting

Dealing With the Dark, Void Situations

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Sunset 2a

I love the sunshine so much that the minute I wake up in the morning, the curtains in my bedroom get thrown wide open!  I want the those sunbeams to stream in! Even on a cloudy day, just the light from the outside is a welcomed change from the darkness within my room.

But what do we do when there’s darkness in our hearts, via a relationship or a circumstance that we cannot change?  It could be as trivial as frustrations, like when I was attempting to write this post and spent a good deal of time editing and rewriting. It was scheduled and ready for posting, but when I went to preview my writing, it was GONE!  What?  After a good couple of hours, it’s nowhere to be found?

I could not change this.  So after stopping and giving this darkness (trouble) this to the Lord, I realized that there must be a reason for this “mistake.”  Maybe it was just that I take time again to call on His Name. Doing so brought light (truth) to my heart – it was, indeed, like throwing open my bedroom curtains.

A lost blog post is trivial, but what about darkness and emptiness in a relationship? There’s a void and distance there that you would love to fill, but you cannot change the other person’s heart.

What about the grief felt when dealing with the consequences of sin – yours or someone whose life touches yours?

Or the sorrow of death or sickness?

We have to go back to the beginning –

Gen 1:2, 3  And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

3 And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.

When there was NOTHING but emptiness and darkness, with only a word, God changed it all into beauty and fullness.

Light, sun, moon, trees, flowers, sky, birds, fish, animals and man and woman were added to the emptiness and it was no longer void – it was FULL.

Who but God could do that?!

No one.

He longs to do the same with our dark and empty circumstances! It all starts when we know that we need His Son as our Savior.  He brings light from the darkness of sin and gives forgiveness and His presence for eternity.

His presence starts the moment we trust Him!  Now all those “dark” situations turn to me towards my God who longs to bring light and life to all these matters!  How?

  • Making me realize Who He is
    • Creator
    • Gracious
    • Kind
    • Loving
    • Able…
  • Making me fall on my knees before Him to ask that He will change this darkness and emptiness for His glory.
  • Making this dependence on Him a daily habit that transforms me into His likeness.

Yes, even losing a post on a blog post can be used to transform me into His image.  As I learn to call, to wait, to trust, to know He is sovereign, I can be more like Christ, if I allow Him to calm my troubled heart and look for Him to make beauty from my darkness.

What dark situation sleeps under your pillow and awakens you with a start?  What “empty” circumstance is causing you to need His light and abundance?  Thank God for that situation today, then call out to Him and wait for Him to transform it…and you!

Denise Signature 150 px

God's character · Uncategorized · waiting

Lessons On Waiting

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rolling-pin

I’ll never forget standing at my kitchen island with my grown, married daughter.  Her first Thanksgiving with her in-laws was coming up and she wanted to make a good impression with the pie she was contributing to the autumn feast.  She was sure about what the filling would be and how delicious it would turn out, but the crust?  That had her panicking, so she had come to my house to get some help.

Now, here we were, standing side by side at the counter.  We each had a bowl of flour, a due amount of Crisco and ice water to mix in, and a rolling pin beside, waiting for its time of duty.

Mom, why don’t you just make crust for me?  It will turn out so much better!

No, I’m sure you can do this.  Just watch while I do each step, then you do it.

Each step brought her closer to the desired result, and then after a little time, the crust had been rolled, picked up and placed into the pie pan.  With another bit of effort, the side crust was duly pinched and crimped, resulting in a crust that looked worthy of a state fair competition!  She was so proud.  It was completed because she was willing to wait.

As I was cleaning up the cloud of flour left on counter and floor, my daughter began talking to me about the desire of her heart, and the difficulty of waiting.  The wait was making her wonder if God was withholding from her because she had done something in the past, and this was her necessary punishment.

Have you ever wondered that?  Has the question of God’s seeming delay to answer made you wonder if He was perhaps angry with you?  We know He could do it, but when He doesn’t, wrong thoughts begin to creep in.

Pointing to the flour-covered rolling  pin we had just used, I said,

You came over here because you wanted the finished product of a pie crust, and you came to me to make it for you. Instead, I had you come near and learn from me.  After time, the result was your beautiful pie crust.

God is doing the same thing in your life, on a much higher plane.  Instead of just handing over to you what you’re asking Him for, He’s pulling you near Himself so that you can learn from Him what you would never learn otherwise.  In the right time, God will answer and provide, and you will be so thankful for the lessons you learned while you waited.

Friend, what are you waiting for today?  Whether it’s huge or small, remind yourself of Truth.  Just because it’s not happening right now, doesn’t mean that God doesn’t love you!  He cannot act outside of His character, and He loves you as much as His own Son!  There are lessons in waiting that will never be learned if God answered your request immediately.  He is a good Father, and He is pulling you close to Himself to teach you and instruct you, to comfort and to prepare you for when the time is just right and He will answer.

The joy on my daughter’s face when she saw her finished pie crust is nothing compared to what I’m seeing God do in her life right now!  I’m pretty sure if you asked her, she would tell you it was well worth the wait.

Maybe we should bronze that rolling pin.  It taught a tremendous lesson to my over-anxious heart.

Keep trusting.  Keep waiting.

 

Denise Signature 150 px