What He's Doing

Have you ever found yourself in the place of saying, 'God, do whatever You want; just DO something?' Perhaps you've experienced a season where you were in a situation you couldn't find your way out of. Maybe there was no way out. Maybe, despite the hours and days and weeks you spent turning the problem over and over and over in your mind, you could never find the solution. Maybe there was no solution. And so you prayed, 'God, do whatever You want; just DO something!' Perhaps at that point you didn't even care what the outcome was, what the 'solution' was, as long as the situation changed, as long as you weren't stuck where you had been for so long, in that tension, in that place of not knowing, in that pressure, in that room of no resolution.

I've been there. And I've been reflecting about being there and about how I asked God to just DO whatever He wanted to do, one way or the other. I had an opinion about which way I wanted the situation to go, but the situation was way beyond my control and I could not make what I wanted to happen, happen.

I thought about it a lot though, too much probably. It pained me that the result I wanted, the one that I thought God spoke to me, didn't seem to be coming. Ever. No matter how long I waited. So I thought, disastrously, 'How can I change my situation?' I wanted out, not caring that the thing I really wanted was on the other side of the waiting, not caring that I knew I would be forfeiting something I really wanted and the thing I believed God wanted to give me. So I thought about how I could essentially sabotage my situation.

Fortunately before I did that a very dear friend said clearly, 'DON'T!' which was what I needed to hear. So I didn't. But in the situation, I was so desperate for change that I came to the point where I didn't care what happened. I knew I would look back and regret my decision, but in the moment, the pressure and the pain were so real and so intense, I didn't really care what the outcome would be, as long as I wasn't stuck in that place. But, because of her one word, I chose not to act but to let God DO what He wanted to do.

I realized not long after that, that as I kept asking Him to DO what He wanted to do, He already was. Because what He really wanted to DO was the work He was doing in my heart in the midst of the waiting, with the help of the pressure and the pain. He was using the lack of resolution and the lack of progress and the lack of light at the end of the tunnel to work on my character, to work on my heart, to work on the depths of the inside of me, and to work on my relationship with Him. He was working. He was DO-ing. I just couldn't see it.

So often that is His way. I think the majority of what He DOES for us, we are not able to see. But there's part of me that thinks He delights in giving us glimpses of the things He is doing that we cannot see, because He likes encouraging us along the road and He likes it when we get excited about what He's doing for us. So in the process, when we cannot see, when we don't know what is going on, when we don't know what He's doing or even IF He's doing anything (which of course He always is), perhaps what we should ask Him is just to give us a glimpse, a hint, a peak at the great things He has in store for us. I think that's fair to ask, seeing as we are His Bride, His partner, His Beloved and His desire is that we would join with Him in what He's doing. I believe He wants to share these things with us, probably more than we even know, but perhaps only if we're really willing to ask, to seek, to knock, and to search them out.

It is the glory of God to hide a matter; to search out a matter is the glory of kings. ~Proverbs 25:2