God’s Time Machine

Since time immemorial humanity’s greatest bone of contention has been the struggle with time. Too soon. Too fast. Not soon enough. Not fast enough. The toughest of all been ‘too slow’. Right now. Right here. Not later, not tomorrow. We want it all today. Now.

For the Christian, it is our greatest temptation. The test of ‘the wait’ would be our biggest trial yet. But it is written, that if we believe and do not doubt, and say to this mountain, be removed and be cast into the sea, we will have whatsoever we say.

Yet nothing happens. Or so we think. We speak and we believe, and we believe and speak. We keep looking out the window. Expecting. Anxious. Delirious. When is it going to come? How much longer before the messenger bearing good tidings appears on the horizon?

Our hearts fail us and our faith wanes. Our confidence dissipates, and unbelief clumps up our blood vessels. We are transformed from believers into hardened manipulators. Altering our future by messing with the present; like the sci-fi movie in which the protagonist teleports in to the future in order to cheat fate in the present.

The result is always a disaster. We are left maimed, like a bird with broken wings, cut short from flying. Despondent. If only we would come to understand the simple but profound truth that God’s ways are not our ways. That for everything under heaven there is a time and a season. And that He makes all things beautiful in his time.

If we would learn to wait just as much as we have mastered speaking and believing, then our faith will be fruitful. For the one who believes must believe that is He is, and that He is the rewarder of those who diligently seek Him. A major characteristic that enables us to “seek” is perseverance. Being able to wait on God’s promises is the button that teleports us into God’s time machine.

Waiting is painful. Much like a crucible intended to boil you free of all impurities. The impurities of self-confidence, overstuffed egos, pride and competition. When we wait, we depend on God’s timing.

And unlike our man-made save-the-day solutions, which is pretty much like the sci-fi time machines, repeatedly altering the future with uncontrollable glitches, God’s time machine is unalterable.

2 Peter 3:9
The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. NIV