Every spring I get so excited at the first glimpse of spring. When we have a warm day, I just get the itch to start planting things! Knowing full well however, as it happens every year that it’s going to get cold again before it warms up for the summer. Though it’s a beautiful day today, yesterday was cold and windy! The weatherman even said we were going to be doing “the wave” this week because the temperatures are going to be so up and down.
So anyway, I just went outside to check on my plants. I hadn’t thought that it got below freezing last night, but apparently it did. The first plants I checked on were fine, they had been under the cover of the porch. As soon as I went around the corner though, I found several plants with black and wilted leaves. Then I went out to the greenhouse I have to play with all of my little “gardening projects”. This year I have waited to plant anything out in the garden. My tomatoes and strawberry plants are all tucked safe and warm in the greenhouse.
But the plants that had their timing a bit off and thought spring was here and had started putting out new leaves are now suffering from the freeze last night. All my little seedlings that had sprouted are all seriously damaged and they may not make it. A whole season of growing, so much opportunity for beauty, all lost in one brief cold spell. If they had only known to wait just another week before they sprouted, they would have remained unscathed and ready for a long summer of growing.
It makes me think of how important timing is. There are so many quotes about timing…
“time in the market, not timing the stock market”…Dad
"Selling a house is all about timing"…Pat
“you’re timing is way off…”…me!!
But it’s hard to wait! Our society now has engrained this into us without us even thinking twice about it. We don’t want to take the time to look in the phone book for a phone number, we call 411. We don’t want to use an encyclopedia (who even has them anymore??) just look it up on the internet, the answer is only a click away. Why should we have to pay for a doctor’s visit, we can type in our symptoms, hit search, and BAM! we’ve got our diagnosis from the internet. My kids watch commercials on tv, they see something they want, next thing I know they’re begging me to take them to Wal-Mart to get it…now! You hear a song you like on the radio, you don’t have to wait to go buy the CD…you can download it immediately! You don’t even have to wait for it to come on the radio anymore, you have an IPod, you can listen to it anytime you want! And then there’s that terrible commercial that my kids love to quote…”it’s my money and I need it now!!” UGH!!!
Our impatience makes us want all of our problems solved immediately and easily and tied up in a pretty little package and NOW!! But that’s not God’s view of things. His timing is much different than ours. As I’ve learned in the past week at our revival, every single bad thing that happens to us is happening to us for a reason. We are to learn from it so we can be able to minister to someone else going to go through a similar situation at some point…to minister to someone in need and be able to tell them how God has helped us through it.
“It is good for me that I have been afflicted; that I might learn thy statutes.” (Psalm 119:71)
“We rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance products character, and character produces hope.” (Romans 5:3-4)
“For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us.” (Romans 8:18)
“Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction so that we will be able to comfort those who are in any affliction with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. For just as the sufferings of Christ are ours in abundance, so also our comfort is abundant through Christ.” (2 Corinthians 1:3-5)
So our time we spend in our problems we’re facing is supposed to be teaching us something. When the time is right…in God’s time, and through God’s will and God’s grace, we will get through it. The only thing we can do is pray about it, trust that God is faithful and that He loves us and that He will answer our prayers. They may not be the answers we wanted or expected, but He will answer.
We can find rest in Him and just like my little plants that were tucked away in the greenhouse, safe and sound, we can tuck ourselves away in God’s arms and be safe until the time is right.
Find rest, O my soul, in God alone; my hope comes from him. (
Psalm 62:4-6)
All of our burdens we are carrying right now, all of the unanswered prayers, the turmoil…they will all be taken care of…in God’s time. When the time is right, the issues will be dealt with and the truth will come to light.
What a Day that will be! No more cold nights—in fact, no more nights! The Day is coming—the timing is God's—when it will be continuous day. Every evening will be a fresh morning. (
Zechariah 14:5-7)
I hope you all have a blessed day!!
Christy
I think this was on "the quest for the perfect birth announcement picture"!! 