Thursday, January 29, 2009

Long Over-due Post

Tomorrow marks 1 month that Greg has been gone. It's been so cool to see how God was preparing the way for him to come to Pretoria. Almost as soon as he arrived he melded into the ministries and programs Eastside is involved with or is starting this year. He's coaching soccer, building relationships with the teens and kids he's working with, and coaching mini-cricket! It's cricket for kindergarden-3rd grade, something like tee-ball is in America. He's learning lots of cool South African phrases and eating lots of interesting new foods.

We email most every day and get to talk on Skype every few days so we've been really lucky. It's still not easy, but it's easier knowing that we're where God wants each of us.

Over the past month God has been teaching me the incredible value of waiting. Today's society has given waiting the stigma that something must be wrong or broken. Think dial-up internet vs. high-speed cable. I get so annoyed when a page doesn't immediately load. What do you mean YouTube won't load?? You mean I have to wait to watch the vintage 21 jesus videos!?! (which, by the way, are hilarious and well worth the wait) But you get the idea.

I am starting to appreciate that good things become better things when you have to wait for them. I was teaching in NexGen the other day about patience and one of my kids said, "Yea - I know what you mean. My dad told me he wouldn't buy me a nice guitar until I learned to play my junky guitar well. I had to work hard for it, but once I earned it, I appreciate it way more than my friend who got a nice guitar right away." Aren't my middle schooler's smart?

One of my favorite Biblical examples is Jacob who meets Rachel and immediately falls in love with her. However, her father requires Jacob to work for him 7 years before he will consent to his daughter's marriage.

"So Jacob served seven years to get Rachel, but they seemed like only a few days to him because of his love for her." Genesis 29:20

Jacob found a woman worth waiting for and wanted nothing less. If he had given up early, he would not have had the best.

So I am learning to wait patiently. Not only for Greg, but also for God's direction in my life. I know God has something big planned for me, but I must wait patiently for it to be revealed.

Waiting, however, does not mean I'm permitted to sit idly by. In the Bible, most of the time God did great things through people, it was only after a period of preparation and training.

God told Abram that he would bear a son but did not fulfill that promise for 25 years. God needed to prepare him to be not just Isaac's father, but the father of a great nation.

Therefore, I'm working this year to learn patience and humility and discipleship and scripture. God is doing incredible things with Fuse right now and if I am not careful, I could miss out on it.

So 1 month down, 11 months to go. I have a lot of learning yet to do. This journey should be fun =)

1 comment:

Leah said...

Great Insight, Friend. God showed me a similar thing a little bit ago and gave me the picture of being a "waiter" (like a server in a restaurant) instead of a "waiter" (twiddling my thumbs and waiting for something to happen). It made the whole idea a lot more active and productive since I got to ask God each day what He wanted and how I could best serve Him rather than asking Him when we were going to stop waiting. And, He gives great tips. :-)

As for my math . . . here's something I've learned through this process. Full-term for a woman's pregnancy is considered 36 weeks, but most women do not have their baby until at least 40 weeks. The full time that they count the pregnancy is actually 10 months not 9 since it's too hard to determine the exact day of conception. Does that make any sense? You can check out babycenter.com if you'd like more explanations. :-) Sorry for the confusion!