When “waiting on the Lord” turns into “I don’t want to grow up”
This cartoon hits home. Like the way cheesecake hits you right before you go on a roller coaster…10 times in a row.
You may be searching for God’s perfect plan to drop out of the sky...But.It.Never.Comes <– We forgot to plan for that part.
So now what??
Well, sometimes we’re content with waiting for the plan to mysteriously unfold before our eyes either by a manifestation or by simply stirring up more passion (is “pretense” a better descriptor?)…and yet for a lot of us, it rarely happens that way, right?? But before you know it, you’ll turn 30 and still won’t be doing anything. Then 40…then 50…
Have you every stopped to consider that while you’re waiting for God to move supernaturally in your life, He’s moving normally in your life too? Younger people like us (and some older people with perpetual adrenal glands) tend to view God’s every move through superlatives:
“If it ain’t got pyrotechnics or a parting Red Sea, than it ain’t from God, and it ain’t for me!”
You’re like the kid who was given a dream that he would be used for great and wonderful things. But when the CEO of a Fortune 500 company approaches you with a job offer, you confidently (and naïvely) reply, “No thanks! I’m waiting on the Lord.”
“Yeah, that’s silly. If an opportunity like THAT came along, I would notice it! God just isn’t opening any doors.”
Maybe that’s the case, or maybe, God just wants you to grab a hold of a few door handles and jiggle them.
God does have something planned for you in the future. But the future doesn’t exclude you from living in the moment. And contrary to our popular belief, it is NOT unspiritual to plan ahead…
Plan your present to prepare for the future. Pardon my brazenness…I just see and hear these types of passive excuses a lot! That God will somehow make everything happen while you kick it in the lounge sippin’ ice-chilled martinis until the moment you jump into the perfect moment of your dreams. Don’t forget that God calls us to partner with Him, which is a graciously abnormal statement to make in the first place! I hope this post frees some of us from that tendency to be lazy and claim that we’re just waiting on God, when maybe He’s waiting on us.
You should be waiting on God. Always.
But it’s still ok to do stuff now…like live your life.
(Cartoon by ASBOJesus)
Posted on April 16, 2011, in mission. Bookmark the permalink. 3 Comments.
Nice.
Tough topic that often gets over ‘spiritulized’.
Too often I think we forget that waiting on the Lord is an active thing. We do things while waiting. Thanks for the great post.
LJ, that is well said. Imagine if I handled my marriage in a similar way….