Girls, it is April. It is freezing outside. There are still traces of snow in my yard that I defiantly set my cute new deck décor on, and I have a fever and some sort of cold/flu. I am OVER it! My toes are mad at me because, you know,” free the toes” syndrome! They are painted bright blue and ready to show themselves! I have cute new sandals staring at me begging to see the world, and some super cute flowy floral shirts that want their time in the sun! We will not be attending our local minor league baseball team opening day like we do every year because yeah, my sick self isn’t sitting in a snowsuit at a baseball game! And so, we wait. We wait for warmth, for kissed by the sun skin, for health, for baseball practices that aren’t cancelled due to snow, for the garden nurseries to open their doors full of flowering gorgeousness, we wait for some sort of sign that spring promises to come! Please Lord, bring us your promises!
Have you ever been in a season of waiting and wondering and hoping things would change, that God would show us the promises that you’ve been praying for? That season in life is hard. If we’re being totally honest, the waiting season usually happens several times throughout our lives, right? And the waiting can be tiring and frustrating and downright angering sometimes! The confusion and pain these seasons often bring have made me question what I thought I knew to be true about God. If God is a good, good Father, then why, why, why do I have to have troubles; waiting seasons…ugh. So in these seasons, I force myself to go to the only truth, and read what God promises, what people dealt with and waited for thousands of years ago, and how they messed up, and cried out to the Lord, and had hardships and pain. I appreciate these stories, and even though they are thousands of years old, and some of the traditions and circumstances are different from our 21st century world, at the core, we are the same. We are all human, and whether we get our food from a grocery store or from manna dropped from the Heavens, we all have a heart and blood coursing through our veins. The truth is that the Bible is the inspired Word of God, and if it’s in that big book, it’s meant to be used by us to seek answers, find comfort, and to find similarities to ourselves in the people that are in it.
So as I’m writing this and moaning in my illness and trying not to glance out my window at the cold yuckyness, I will remind myself of the promises that God gives us, and I will remember that even when it doesn’t FEEL like things will get better, and when it seems like the answers aren’t coming, I will choose to believe the Truth, the Word of God. And the Word of God tells us through the lives of the Israelite people freed from slavery, that God is good. It tells us that even in prison, Paul is given all he needs. It tells us that once dried up old bones in Ezekiel Chapter 37 will be given breath and new life. Genesis 17 tells us that the shriveled up loins of a 100 year old man can produce a promised child. All throughout this book of life we find answers and truth and that really, our struggles aren’t that different from those of people thousands of years ago. We all want peace and family and direction and comfort. The Bible proves that God comes through every time; whether we feel it in the moment or season of struggle or not. The truth tells us that He is good on his promises; we need only to trust and believe. Now, please know girlfriends that it is easy to write these words and give my thoughts and encouragement to you, and it is an entirely different ball game when I am personally in a season of unrest. But, that beautiful thing called hindsight that I so dearly cherish gives me perspective as I look back at the past troubles, and can see on the other side of those times how God has provided and literally “breathed new life” into my family, and into my financial, emotional and spiritual health. For every hard season, I could share with you what God has taught me, and how He provided. How about you? Can you look back and see how God worked things out for you? Can you choose to believe that if He did it in the past, that He will come through again? I promise that I get it. It will not “feel” good at times, but TRUTH isn’t about feelings, it’s about God. “Trust in the Lord with all your heart. Lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight.” Proverbs 3:5-6. I choose to believe that the ‘season of snow’ will go away, my new deck décor will flourish, and your “deck décor” will flourish too.
