Don’t you sometimes feel like Abraham ? No I don’t mean the father of the faith Abraham, nor the Abraham who believed and had it credited to him as righteousness, not just then. Rather, the Abraham who was called by God, walked with God, was blessed greatly by God, so far so good, and yet had a major outstanding promise in his life that was not fulfilled and did not look like it ever would be.
You know the one, the Abraham who had just heard God hold forth some more on the awesome, mind boggling, amazing, unimaginable good things He would do for him, who said, yes, thank you, but…, but, I still have this problem here and you have not fixed it yet; the Abraham who took a short cut that we all lived to regret, that Abraham. The great father of faith was being human and God, was being God. And often that ‘s where we are too.
The list may be long, or it may be short but God has said some pretty amazing things to you, you have rejoiced, you have shouted, but at some point you begin to say, ‘yes, Lord, but…, what about the ministry, what about the money, what about the man, the woman, the child? And that is where some people, at best, take short cuts like Abraham, at worst, turn away, get bitter, get upset, and give up; don’t. God knows exactly what He’s doing.
I marvel at what God sees. We say He sees the end from the beginning but we do not always believe it do we? I marvel that while poor Abraham was griping about being childless, was being miserable at the thought of leaving all his possessions to his servant Eleazar of Damascus, God was unperturbed. I know He was, because He calmly told Abraham what would happen to his offspring in the future, their sojourn and oppression in Egypt for 400 years and their exodus. Did you get that?
In other words, before one single infant had proceeded from the loins of our man, God already saw and spoke of the two million odd persons (some estimate the number at over 3 million) who would descend from him and leave Egyptian captivity. Quite obviously they were not seeing the same thing. God could afford to wait, He was not worried. His divine purposes must be established in His divine timing. Abraham just needed to learn to chill.
So do we, this came forcefully home to me the other day as I was deep in conversation with Father God reminding Him of a particular outstanding promise and He began to minister to me about divine purposes and divine timing. God’s timing for Isaac was in Abraham’s hundredth year, why, we know not. Abraham’s was probably at least fifty years before. He waited for years since the promise and then one day God said ‘next year’, his wife thought someone was joking and laughed. But God said it will happen ‘at the appointed time’; and it did.
Yes, 25 years seems like a long time, especially when you are already 75 but in the light of eternity, it is but a moment.There are delays which the enemy causes and those must be stopped instantly; but a supernatural people must not base thoughts, feelings, reactions on what is happening now in the natural, rather on what Father is saying about His thoughts, purposes and intent, about His timing. It means embracing the unusual, the unexpected, the non-conformist. It means understanding that divine purposes supersede personal convenience or even understanding.
But as is often the case with God, the seemingly unattainable and complex becomes ordinary and commonplace. Childbearing later became a sport Abraham excelled at, his later years were infinitely more fruitful than the earlier. And to think there was a time when it all looked hopeless. Until God’s timing kicked in and divine purposes were brought to bear. There is an appointed time, embrace it.