When reality meets our expectations, sometimes we are badly disappointed. But when we can put our faith to work and see how God can use our circumstances, it’s then that we see the miraculous.
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Three little girls are playing in the yard. One is standing at the end of a makeshift aisle, one is throwing flowers on the ground all around, and one is walking down the aisle with a pillow case tied to her pony tail, pretending to be a bride on her wedding day. Little girls dream their whole lives about the day they will get married. There are expectations of what it will be like and who their groom will be. As children, we might not have known how we were going to find our way to the altar, we didn’t know what life circumstances would put us together with the right one for us, we just knew that some day it would happen.
Despite our childhood fantasies, no love story is perfect. In fact, real love very often is not easy. Sometimes getting to the altar is a miracle in itself because of what it took to get there, or maybe how many years it took to get there. Whatever the case may be, a wedding day is a celebration of all it took to bring two life’s together. It’s something we look forward to. And when the day arrives, or for some when it’s finally over, there is a certain amount of satisfaction to have gotten through every moment that led to it—whether it was stress or hectic scheduling or even arguments over it. The day is over, a new phase of life begins, and no matter how we got there and got through it, at least we did!
I have been told many times that once we bring our baby home, we will feel similarly. We will realize that every moment of uncertainty and every moment spent waiting will be worth it because we will have the child that God prepared for us. But today, we are still in the waiting and wondering stage. We don’t know how it’s all going to come together or when it will happen. There are so many questions still unanswered in our adoption story.
As I read my Bible, I am always so convicted by stories of great faith. We read the story knowing the ending, but I always think to myself that they didn’t know their endings. So how could they move forward with such faith? I think of Esther who was put in the kingdom for such a time as this and of Joseph who saw that God meant all things for good. But they had to of had some very real questions in their minds of if God was going to work it all out, right?
When I read Romans chapter 8 recently, I saw trusting God in a whole new light. Verse 28 says, “And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.” I love this verse! It’s where faith and God intersect—where we are told to have faith because God is going to work it all out. It’s a great verse, but it’s in an even greater chapter about hoping in God’s work.
Here we see the early church suffering for Christ’s sake. And Paul is encouraging them that what they are going through is going to bring them greater peace than they can fathom. Verse 18 says, “For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.” Paul wants them to look past their present circumstances and see the spreading of the Gospel to every people group; he wants to look even further and see Heaven shining as a beacon in the background that will one day be their home. There is a brighter day coming and a bigger plan being enacted in their lives. Paul could envision it, and he wanted them to as well.
Through faith we can believe that something greater is coming down the road. He says in verse 24, “For we are saved by hope: but hope that is seen is not hope: for what a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for? 25 But if we hope for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it.” Could Esther and Joseph and the other great examples of faith see into the future to know their stories would work out so well? In a way, I think they could see with eyes of faith. They didn’t know how they would get there, but they knew God would get them there. And because of that, they could patiently wait for His timing.
The same can be true for us. You might not know the trials and life circumstances that are going to get you to different milestones in your life, but you can have peace in the meantime if you will have eyes of faith to trust God will work each detail of your story out. You might not be wondering how you will get to the altar, if you will have a child someday, or how you are ever going to get through something, but you do know the God who does. Walk with Him in peace knowing that your story has a happily ever after even if the here and now is still being worked out. Hope brings faith and faith brings the patience to get you to the end.
