Timing and Trust

God’s timing. It’s perfect. It’s good. And it doesn’t make sense so many times. It’s so hard to do things God’s way because we think we know better. Or, we acknowledge that we don’t know better, but we would still rather do things our way because at least we are in control that way. Isn’t that amazing? We would sacrifice the best for the mediocre simply so we don’t have to trust anyone else with our lives. Trust is hard. It means letting go of the reins and believing that wherever God takes us is the best place to be, even if we don’t want to be there. But I’m digressing. I started talking about God’s timing and ended up talking about trust. I guess it makes sense; they are closely related. In order to accept God’s timing we have to trust Him first.

Have you ever asked God, “Why now?” I have asked Him that question a lot, both when He has brought difficult things in my life and when He has brought blessings into my life. Sometimes it feels like all of the difficult things are grouped together in life, that once you get hit with one thing then everything hits. You feel like you’re drowning and you finally surface and get a gulp of air only to get pushed down again by something else. I’ve been there. I’ve also been in the other boat, too. These are the times when God heaps blessing upon blessing upon you and you ask “Why?” because you know you don’t deserve it. These are times when you get overwhelmed by God’s love for you, and in turn it grows your love for your Father. Life happens like this, doesn’t it? At least it does for me. This is when it is hard to understand God’s timing. In my teeny human mind, I would spread out the good and bad times evenly so life doesn’t get overwhelming. I know I would, but even as I write this I realize how different my life would be and what a different person I would be if that was actually how it happened. And to be honest, I wouldn’t want it. The intense bad times makes character growth skyrocket. You will never grow like when your world seems to be falling apart. When everything is crumbling away you have to hang onto God for dear life because there is nothing left to stand on. Once you make it through those times, however, it makes the good times better and the blessings sweeter. God’s timing is perfect. He will never ask us to do something we can’t. He will break us but not destroy us. That’s a promise we have to cling to when life doesn’t make sense. When God’s timing doesn’t make sense.