Easy? Said who?

The coming month of October is going to be a very big month in my house.  For one, we've worked for 3 years toward remodeling our home and have continually put off putting in new flooring.  Now, we've finally arrived.  As I type, they are at my house laying the new tile and in the next couple weeks will be coming in the lay the new carpet.  Its a very big deal for me.  Another very big deal is that my husband is meeting with the board regarding his ministerial licensing.  This.Is.Huge.  Several years ago my family and I were visiting my brother and sister-in-law in Alexandria, LA when a man that I did not know asked my dad if I was married to a preacher.  My dad replied "No, she isn't married at all."  The man responded, "Well, she will be."  I had just gone through a horrible divorce and had moved back in with my parents.  I took that word that day as a promise from God that he had not forgotten about me. 

All those years ago, I made a mistake in believing what God said, but not realizing the whole truth. Mark Twain said, “It’s not what you know that hurts you. It’s what you know that isn’t so.” When God called me to be a minister's wife, to write, etc., I wholeheartedly believed Him.  Yet, as most humans do, I lack patience, so I mistakenly thought that if I just followed Him the results would be instantaneous. However, several important components.  First, elapsed time.  Brutally honest - after almost 10 years of "elapsed time," I had almost given up believing this day would arrive. 


We can read through Deuteronomy and the exciting adventures of the Israelites and miss the parts that reveal how much time elapsed. Moses spent forty years in Midian working for his father-in-law. For forty years Moses led an often rebellious Israel in the wilderness. Joshua came under Moses’ tutelage at age forty-five, but didn’t take over leading the nation until forty years later. Caleb “followed the LORD [his] God fully” for forty-five years. At age eighty-five Caleb, with the help of the LORD, drove out the Anakim and took as his inheritance from Moses the fortified cities and territory of Hebron (Joshua 14:6-15). Our journey and mission with God is for a lifetime; not the overnight-instant-success-name-it-and-claim-it pseudo gospel our modern culture leads us to believe. 
The whole issue isn't completely just in the waiting either.  I didn't have the slightest idea what this one simple day would require of me.  I had no idea it would take years of labor.  If you notice, throughout their lifetimes Moses, Joshua, and Caleb weren’t sitting in rocking chairs on the front porch, sipping coffee and waiting for God to do something amazing on their behalf.  They were working hard and doing battle.  God repeatedly told the Israelites to possess the Promised Land. Possess does not mean to merely show up and move in. Possess means “to occupy by driving out previous tenants and possess their place. By implication—to seize, to expel, destroy, without fail.” God expected the Israelites to do battle for their land.  Only the Lord knows the battles we have fought due to misguided, well-meaning saints and others who allowed Satan to use them as spears to pierce our hearts. 

Why did I believe pursuing God’s mission for me would be easy? Why did I fall for the subtle, but disabling lie that if I was living God’s plan for me everything would come together easily and on my timetable? How did I miss Exodus 23:29-30, where concerning possessing the Promised Land God tells Moses, “But I will not drive them out in a single year, because the land would become desolate and the wild animals too numerous for you. Little by little I will drive them out before you, until you have increased enough to take possession of the land.” 
The new adventure October brings will definitely be scary, but I'm thankful that I've learned two valuable lessons becauase of it.  1) Living God’s mission requires hard work...and sometimes even going into battle. 2) Living God’s mission takes time and only God knows the timetable.  Only He can truly know when we have increased enough to take possession of our Promised Land.

XOXO
Amberly