What Feels Like Waiting Is Often God Creating Perfect Timing

​When the Messiah came, the Israelites had been waiting for centuries for his arrival. Their waiting was filled with longing and uncertainty and at times, doubt.

All they had to lean on was God's promises spoken through the prophets over the years:

Micah 5:2: The Messiah would be born in Bethlehem.
Isaiah 7:14: He would be born of a virgin.
Numbers 24:17: A star would announce His coming.
Genesis 49:10: He would come from the tribe of Judah.

Maybe that is the hardest part of our relationship with God. We are often a people of "right now" and our God is often a God of "wait until later."

I honestly have no idea why God is so into making us wait. I don't. I mean, I have so many perfect "right now" answers if God would only adopt them and deliver them.

But no.

My God is into wait.

Just wait, Keith.

I suppose it can be a mistake, though. To assume that in the waiting nothing is happening. To assume that in the waiting God isn't using our time of waiting to create his perfect timing.

I often say, I can explain away a lot of things in my life as possibly NOT God. The one I can NEVER explain away, though, is perfect timing. A supernatural weaving together of moments and experiences and longings in just the right way and at just the right moment that makes sense of waiting in a way no natural power could do.

You know, the Messiah came at just the right time if the mission of the baby in the manger was going to be to spread God's message of peace and hope and love.

Roads and a common language had developed. Many cultures were dissatisfied with existing religions, creating openness to the gospel. And most people by this time were well versed in the aforementioned old testament prophesies, so they would be more likely than ever to know this baby as the Messiah.

The Israelites had been waiting all that time; and God had been using all that time to create his supernatural perfect timing.

I do work today in my professional life that is as fulfilling as any work I have ever done. Work I can not imagine not doing. It's work that weaves together my life experiences with trauma and addiction and broken relationships.

I waited my whole life to feel this kind of perfect fulfillment in my work; and God was busy putting together the experiences of my whole life to create his supernatural perfect timing.

In addition, writing has become a critical and fulfilling part of my life. My day is not complete if I can't do it. In many ways, I have waited all my life to be a writer; and all my life God was weaving together the stories of my life and weaving writing instruction into my life so that that writing would show up as a demonstration of His supernatural perfect timing.

There are things I still wait on now, long for. There are moments in my life, still, when I find myself asking, how long, oh Lord? And I have heard God respond, as clearly and with as much assurance as I have ever heard God's voice, "something beautiful is on the way."

Christmas helps me believe this. Christmas, the greatest promise ever delivered outside of the promise that in three days that baby would rise again.

Maybe on your way to Bethlehem, you too are waiting. Yes, you agree, Christmas is important, but maybe you find yourself totally distracted by the things in your life you are waiting for, promises that feel undelivered.

I encourage you to bring yourself back to Christmas, and maybe don't see it as that baby in a manger, but see it as a God who does not believe in wasted time. A God who always, with supernatural power, turns what felt like the longest wait ever into the most perfectly timed delivery ever.

Something beautiful is on the way to you.

Yes, Christmas. But also yes, things that right now feel like waiting in your life. Things that feel like undelivered promises.

Feel peace in your waiting, for our God is a deliverer. Little reminds us of that more than Christmas.