When God finally put camp on the table in 2023, Steven and I were both roughly thirty-eight years old. Now three years in, and yep, doing the math you can figure out that we are both now roughly forty-one. For years, we thought full-time ministry just wasn’t for us, even though we’d both had a heart for it since we were teenagers, and even though we both attended a Bible college. We would ask God “why…”, when it was so very evident to us that we understood the need for those who would minister, “…why wouldn’t He call us?” And the answer for so long was “Do what you can, where you can, regardless.”

The amazing, wondrous thing is that we can look back over the last twenty years and see all the experience that God has orchestrated so we’d be prepared to do the work of the calling He has finally given us. Had He called us to do this right out of college, we would have been incapable of accomplishing it.

Our soul waiteth for the LORD: he is our help and our shield. For our heart shall rejoice in him, because we have trusted in his holy name. Let thy mercy, O LORD, be upon us, according as we hope in thee. (Psalm 33:20-22)

 So I want to encourage you today in your waiting. Encourage you to think of yourself as a weapon or a tool that needs tempering. And while with many, He tempers them as He is wielding them, with some of us He waits to wield us until after we have been tempered. We need to recognize that we would not have been nearly as effective as a weapon or tool otherwise.

Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations: that the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honor and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ. (1 Peter 1:6-7)

 This sounds so detached and indifferent, but we (should) know that the opposite is true! Not only do we have the objective care of a craftsman who has affection for His own work, but we have the love of a Father for His own child. None of our dreams are wasted by time when He holds our days in His hands. Persist in His leading as you choose to trust in His love.

Because thy lovingkindness is better than life, my lips shall praise thee. (Psalm 63:3)