Have you ever felt like you were made for more? Do you feel a tug on your heart that where you are currently is not the fulfillment of what you were created to be? Or maybe you’ve heard directly from God that He has bigger plans for you. Yet somehow you can’t seem to lay hold of it.
About 15 years ago, God gave me a promise. One night I very clearly heard Him say, “David, I am going to use you in ways far beyond anything you could imagine.”
“What? Did I hear that right? Who am I that You would choose to use me in such a mighty way?” Yet that promise kept playing over and over in my head. If that was really God, I was going to need Him to confirm it.
The next night I went to a service with a prophetic speaker. In the middle of his message, he stopped for a moment, and then said, “I’m speaking to one person in this auditorium. God is going to use you in ways far greater than anything you could imagine.”
That caught my attention. I quickly asked the Lord, “God, there are probably 500 people in the room. Is this for me?”
No sooner did I finish my thought than the speaker looked straight at me, and with a slightly ticked-off attitude in his voice, he said it again. “God is going to use YOU in ways far greater than anything you could imagine.” Talk about a God moment!
Fast forward 15 years, and I have yet to see the fulfillment of this in my life. Yes, Cherie and I live on a bus and travel the United States. We’ve encountered countless people in need. God has used us to meet the need in so many of these lives, and when He does, I hear in my spirit, “This is an appetizer.” But we’ve certainly not even come close to the “far greater than anything you can imagine” that God spoke to me years ago.
So here I am, just like many of you, in the space between the now and the not yet… waiting. And this is what I want to share with you about – the waiting time.
Imagine with me for a minute. Picture two towers, one 100 stories high, the other reaches to the heavens. They are both surrounded by several other buildings 50, 60, 70 stories tall. Now imagine yourself on the 50th floor of the 100-story building, and your God-given destiny is to be on the top floor. Take a look out the window. What can you see? Maybe pedestrians and cars are down on the street. Maybe a bird flies by. Maybe it’s raining. As you look, you know there is so much more to see (after all, you are on the 50th floor!), but you can’t see it because there are so many other buildings obstructing your view. Now imagine Jesus standing on the roof of the tower that reaches to the heavens. What can He see? Absolutely everything, as far as the eye can see.
“My thoughts are nothing like your thoughts,” says the Lord.” And my ways are far beyond anything you could imagine. For just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so My ways are higher than your ways and My thoughts higher than your thoughts.” (Isaiah 55:8-9 NLT)
When we are on the 50th floor – or the 5th or the 75th or even when we reach the 100th – our visibility is limited. We can’t see it all. Maybe our vision is obstructed by a lack of clarity about a situation. Or pride clouds our view. Or we hold a way of thinking that’s not as aligned with God as we think it is. Whatever the obstruction, God is using that opportunity to teach us, train us, mold us, and strengthen us more and more. Sometimes we may not understand our walk due to the lack of visibility, and God uses that to keep us in check so we don’t run ahead of Him and His plan.
In our inability to see everything clearly, we learn to trust Him, who can see it all. He is always leading us if we are trusting Him with every step we take. As we learn, grow, and trust, God elevates us floor by floor, always closer to the destiny He created us for.
Trusting is the key to resting in the promise of the more to come. We can rest in the promise or we can become anxious about it. (I know Jesus must have Italian in Him. I often hear Him tell me, “David, take it easy!”) 🙂 Doing it our way takes longer, has minimal effect, and requires ibuprofen to cope along the way. Resting requires trusting the One who created us for this journey, who loves us, and who knows is all. So rest. Relax. If God is in charge of your life, enjoy the journey. If He’s not, I encourage you to let him be. “The Lord directs the steps of the godly. He delights in every detail of their lives” (Psalm 37:23 NLT). “We can make our plans, but the Lord determines our steps” (Proverbs 16:9 NLT). Let God hold you and see what happens.
And for those in the waiting… don’t give up. Sometimes we don’t see our own progress. The view from the 25th floor looks a lot like the view from the 22nd floor. God knows what He’s doing. And He hasn’t given up on you.
Love you all!
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For I am about to do something new. See, I have already begun. Do you not see it? I will make a pathway through the wilderness. I will create rivers in the dry wasteland.
~ Isaiah 43:19 NLT
And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue His work until it is finally finished on the day when Jesus Christ returns.
~Phillipians 1:6 NLT