46 days until my IHOP Atlanta internship.
15 days until I see and hug my family.
11 days left of the World Race.
4 days left of ministry.
For me, everything seems significantly easier when there’s a countdown attached to it. I can handle eating a single bird egg with rice another night because I know I only have 4 days left at this Vietnamese fishing village. I can handle being away from my best friend and her new husband another day because in 18 short days we will have a Monopoly Deal tournament while we pound down freshly baked cookies with a spoon! I can look forward to these days with GREAT JOY because there’s an end to my time of waiting. A time is coming SOON, so very soon, where my dreams of hugging my friends and family and eating my own choice of food WILL become a reality.
But there are other aspects of my life that don’t have a countdown or expiration date.
When I was 12 years old, the Lord spoke to me while I was sitting at a Southern Baptist church service and said that He was calling me to marriage, and that my husband and I would be “known amongst the nations by our testimony.” He instructed me to steward this promise well, so I surrounded myself with married couples, attended marriage conferences, and read a variety of marriage books. I was 12, guys. TWELVE. I knew then that it was more than just a young girl’s dream of being whisked away by her prince charming, it was the call of God over my life – for His purposes. Since then, I hoped and prayed and asked the Lord to prepare me to handle the weight of this joyous blessing.
And I waited, and continued to wait… and wait… and wait.
Men came into my life – a charming youth pastor, a charismatic physical trainer, to name a few – men that I thought were my promise incarnated. After investing months, and even years, of my heart into these relationships, they came to an end. Before signing up for the World Race, I was told about a contract in which they enforce a strict “no-dating” policy. Never in my life have I knowingly committed an entire year to singleness, but I felt ready – ready to forget everything about men, relationships, and especially marriage.
>>> Fast forward to Siem Reap, Cambodia : Month 8
I was taking an evening swim in our guesthouse pool after a long day of painting the roof of our ministry site. As I was wading through the water, I heard the Holy Spirit speak to my heart in the stillness of the night. “Your promises are coming.” My heart stopped, then started racing, while my blood started boiling. “NO. Stop.”
The voice in my head began to pick up speed, almost to the rhythm of Paul Revere when he ran through the streets shouting “The British are coming! The British are coming!”
…”Your promises are coming. Your promises are coming.”
A new-found anger took over my whole body. I was physically shaking with it. Frustrated, I got out of the pool and wrapped myself in my REI quick-dry towel. I sat on one of the wooden pool chairs and internally had-it-out with the Lord.
“I’m actually quite content being single.”
“Don’t mock Me and call your lack of faith ‘contentment’ “
I shook with anger, desperately trying to find a way to get out of the conversation. I told Him that I was willing to talk to Him whenever He wanted to drop this subject …Not exactly the most mature move ever, on my part.
The next day, one of my male teammates suggested that I read a book called Redeeming Love. Normally, I’m against all-things fiction, but I decided to give it a try. I was hooked before I even finished the Prologue. The author’s words fully immersed me into the story. A girl with a heart of stone and an unspeakable past, loved by a man fiercely determined to show her what love really looks like. She fought him, hard. She didn’t want to feel vulnerable to his love. She didn’t want to be let down again. Familiar words jumped off the pages that I’ve thought a million times but never spoke of out loud.
“Hope was cruel. The aroma of sustenance before a starving child. Not milk. Not meat. Hope was a dream and reaching for it turned her life into an unbearable nightmare.”
“She sat in silent torment. She struggled against the emotions tearing at her, remorse, guilt, confusion. They became a solid mass, a hardened lump growing in her throat and chest, like a cancer spreading pain into every limb. She was afraid. The hope she thought long-since dead was resurrected. She had forgotten the small light that had sometimes flickered inside her as a child. Something would strike its spark, and it would grow—until it was crushed again.”
“God… I feel what she feels.” With humble admission, what started out as simply reading a new book turned into a full-out soul journey. My heart ached more and more – my own brokenness and weakness revealed with each turning page.
He was right. In an attempt to mask my lack of faith, I hid behind Philippians 4:9, claiming to be “content” rather than holding on to a desperate hope for God to come through. After years of heartache, rejection, and failed relationships, it would much easier to lay down God’s promise of stepping into marriage than to face the possibility of more heartache and disappointment.
In the book of Genesis, God made a promise to Abraham – that he would be the father of many nations. I often wonder if Abraham felt the ache of waiting for his promises year after year. In his case, there wasn’t a countdown. He just had to wait, and keep waiting, until his promise came to pass. Abraham’s response wasn’t, “It’s okay if you don’t, God. I’m content.” No. He had faith that ALL the promises of God are “Yes” and “Amen”. THAT was his response. That’s what my response should be as well.
One of my favorite chapters of Redeeming Love is when Michael Hosea takes her to the mountainside. The sun rises, and as the light spills over the hills, he turns to her and says, “This is the life I want to give you.”
(Watercolor & ink : Kayla Zilch)
For some of you, Jesus is whispering promises to your heart right now – promises that don’t have a countdown, promises that are hard to hope for because you’ve been waiting so long already. But, friends, the One who is Faithful spoke to you and placed a calling on your life. He will lead you into that promise. Embrace hope again, no matter how much it hurts. I don’t know how long you’ll have to wait, but eventually the waiting WILL end, and you will see for yourself the fruit of His faithfulness. He’s saying to you “This is the life I want to give you”, not to torment you, but to remind you to keep holding on.
If you share in my struggle, maybe you can share in my hope.
Your promises are coming.
