In His time and not my own

We pray for blessings, we pray for peace

Comfort for family, protection while we sleep

We pray for healing, for prosperity

We pray for Your mighty hand to ease our suffering

All the while, You hear each spoken need

Yet love us way too much to give us lesser things

Cause what if Your blessings come through raindrops?

What if Your healing comes through tears

What if a thousand sleepless nights

Are what it takes to know You’re near?

What if trials of this life

Are Your mercies in disguise?

We pray for wisdom, Your voice to hear

We cry in anger when we cannot feel You near

We doubt Your goodness, we doubt Your love

As if every promise from Your Word is not enough

And all the while You hear each desperate plea

And long that we'd have faith to believe

Cause what if Your blessings come through raindrops

What if Your healing comes through tears?

What if a thousand sleepless nights

Are what it takes to know You’re near?

And what if trials of this life

Are Your mercies in disguise

When friends betray us, when darkness seems to win

We know the pain reminds this heart

That this is not, this is not our home

It's not our home

What if my greatest disappointments

Or the achings of this life

Is the revealing of a greater thirst

This world can’t satisfy?

And what if trials of this life

The rain, the storms, the hardest nights

Are Your mercies in disguise?  

- Laura Story

                 

“For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.” Jeremiah 29:11

”A man’s heart plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps.” Proverbs 16:9


“O Lord, I know the way of man is not in himself; it is not in man who walks to direct his own steps.” Jeremiah 10:23


“Delight yourself also in the Lord, and He shall give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord, trust also in Him, and He shall bring it to pass … Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for Him.”
Psalm 37:4,7

A Restless Soul

I am plagued by restlessness. It is a restlessness that is both sinful and healthy seemingly growing from the same root -- I'm discontented because I feel stuck in the mud yet I feel discontented because I want more out of this life essentially wanting to do more for Him. At times it isn't a fun place to be while at other times it is the one thing that motivates me to keep pushing forward.

St. Augustine once said that our hearts are restless until we find our rest in God. If that is so then why do so many Christians feel so restless?  Why do so many of us who know, love and have our hearts set on Christ, feel so tossed about? Why do I feel lost?

There are six words that the apostle Paul writes in Philipians 3:20 that profoundly changed my perspective on life. "But our citizenship is in heaven". What an awesome thought, earth is my temporary home and i'm just passing through -- it is a waiting room for my real home in heaven. And just like any other waiting room I grow impatient and hopeless thinking that my turn will never come or that I've been forgotten. My home is in heaven and deep down my restlessness comes from my desire to be with Him and to get away from this world. I try to find fulfilment and satisfaction in jobs, vacations, friends, relationships but nothing satisfies. Then I think even if I did pursue a different career, a different job, a new relationship, it wouldn't matter because it won't change a thing. The turmoil will still remain because essentially I am longing for my heavenly home.

As far as what I am to be doing as I wait I know that the times and seasons are marked out by the Lord and it is known only by Him. Anxiety and worry have no place when it comes to trusting in His wisdom, I need not concern myself with details of life that do not make sense to me. He sees the big picture and is weaving my tapestry. I need to forget what lies behind and strain forward to what lies ahead, pressing on toward the goal of the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus (Phil 3:13). So maybe feeling restless isn't so bad after all :)