The illusion of God's delay

Why is it that God delays? I have thought about this a lot the last several years, as we have gone down a long and often very hard path seeking God’s plan for the next phase of our lives. Does God not care about the situation we are in? Does he not see our desperation? Does he not hear our prayers?

The other night, I was reading that extraordinary story in the Gospels where the disciples were straining at the oars for hours, making little progress. All of a sudden, Jesus showed up, walking across the waters. They took him into the boat, and by supernatural intervention, they instantly reached the other side of the lake.

Like so many Bible stories, we read this one with the end in mind. We already know what’s going to happen. But we forget that those guys in the boat had no idea whether Jesus was going to show up for them or not. They were almost certainly desperate. They were probably near the end of their strength. They were likely terrified of drowning. And you can be sure they had been praying.

But their prayers had not been answered.

What do you think they were thinking? Probably most of the same things we are thinking when God fails to resolve our crisis when we think he should.

But the question we should be asking ourselves is not “Why is God delaying?” but “What is God doing?”

Sometimes God is taking the extra time to bring elements of his plan for us together which are at present unseen to us. The whole world does not revolve around you or me. Other people and circumstances are involved too, and have to be brought into the picture.

Sometimes he is saving us from things we at first asked for. How many times have you thanked God he did not give you that job, that relationship, that accommodation, that place of ministry you asked him for?

Often, he is simply changing and refining us as we pray, because in the process we are drawn closer to him through our seeking of him. Hopefully we discover it is more important to seek God than the thing we are asking for.

For all these reasons, we then look back and thank the Lord that it worked out the way it did.

The fact is that God does not delay at all. The word “delay” implies that something that should have taken place now does not take place until later. But God’s timing is as perfect as all of his ways. What seems to us to be delay is actually God working out his perfect plan for us.

So if you are caught up right now in what to you is a very much in-your-face delay, may I suggest you follow the advice James gave to those who were experiencing the same kind of thing: ask God for wisdom (James 1:5). Ask God what he is doing in your heart and circumstances. Ask him for patience. Cast yourself on him. Cry out to him. But don’t give up.

Because the very point at which you feel like giving up is often the moment God breaks through. When we are at our most desperate is when he receives the most glory for what he does, because everyone knows it is him, not us who has done it.

And when God moves, he often does so with great speed. Isaiah put it this way: “I am the Lord; in its time I will do it quickly” (Isaiah 60:22).

I read that verse the other night. And I read it just at the point where God had intervened in our lives in an extraordinary way, which in a matter of weeks resolved issues we had been facing for years.

More of that next week…

Adrian Smith: What happens when the tsunami hits

In June 2013 I had a heart attack which almost took my life. During surgery I suffered a cardiac arrest and for a short time had a sense of being somewhere else – a place filled with mellow late afternoon light; silent, without dimensions or boundaries. It felt very good. Peace, no pain, then suddenly with a bang the defibrillator kicked me back into the operating theatre, with sounds of frantic activity and anxious voices saying you’re ok, you’re going to be ok. (They were more anxious than I was).

The surgeon treating me said with a wry smile afterwards “you gave us a fright - that one was out to kill you.” Earlier one of the ambulance paramedics and a member of the surgeon’s team each used the same phrase – “you were in the right place at the right time.” It could have been very different but for a weather forecast which made me decide not to go cycling off the beaten track on that particular day.

Just two days before the heart attack I had a vivid dream in which I saw myself swimming in a rough sea when from nowhere a tsunami wave came straight for me. In my dream I knew I only had minutes to live. I woke up with a bang, alive and suddenly wide awake. I went to my office and wrote down what I had just experienced. I dream a lot, mostly nonsense and quickly forgotten. But I have had three highly significant dreams over my lifetime that I can still remember in detail and which communicated something which changed the course of my life, and in one case that of our church community.

My initial reaction to the dream was that’s not for me, it must be a warning for someone else. I don’t feel as though I’m out of my depth or in rough water at this moment, life is busy but that’s normal and I feel fine. So that morning I typed up the notes made at 3am and emailed them to about half a dozen people I thought might bring some sense out of what I had experienced in the dream. One of my friends replied by return – “that was for me I need to get out of the deep water I’m in right now before the wave hits.” Great, I thought, that’s a result.

Another of my friends had a different reaction as he read my email – this is for Adrian, he is going to die. How do you share something like that, fortunately he didn’t but prayed instead.

Like the dream, the heart attack came totally out of the blue. I was finishing off a job at a property half an hour’s drive from home. I recognised the classic symptoms - intense pain in the chest and arms, the feeling that I was about to pass out, difficulty breathing. But part of me was arguing back - I don’t do heart attacks, I keep fit cycling, the medics say I’m low risk….

The ambulance reached me within minutes of my call and two hours later, surgery completed, I was fixed. By the time my wife Nicky reached me I was sitting in bed drinking tea, feeling as though I had been run over by several buses. I truly love all the wonderful people who work in our National Health Service.

On the first anniversary of the heart attack I visited what is for me a special place of meeting: St Michael and All Angels Parish Church in Felton, Northumberland. Why would God communicate with me through a dream which mirrored the heart attack experience but did not include sufficient detail to send me scurrying to Accident and Emergency to avoid it?

As I sat in St Michaels I had a sense of Jesus saying that he was with me when the tsunami wave hit and left me defenceless and completely vulnerable. He showed me that we were both in the wave and then we beached and stood together on the shore watching as it receded, its power spent.

The dream had been sent to show me he knew the wave was coming. It came and he didn’t stop it, but he was with me, my journey and his were intertwined.

I feel as though I have been given some “extra time” and I want to use it to grow in friendship with the one who was with me in the “wave.” I trust him more now, even when bad things happen.

Watch the company you keep

What kind of people do you like to be around? What kind of people should you be around? It’s worth asking the question.

Elaine and I have just returned from two weeks in northern England. We enjoyed a whirlwind tour of seven churches, and were encouraged to see the grace of God at work in all of them.

During that time we had the privilege of staying with couples who were absolutely full of two essential ingredients of healthy leadership - faith and vision. It was a feast to move from home to home and listen to the stories of how God met these folk, often in the midst of impossibly faith-stretching situations.

Here’s a “taster” of what we found. Different couples are involved in the different stories.

Lack of money to pay the bills? No problem, they pray and God provides, often at the last minute and in completely unpredictable ways. No house to live in? No problem, they pray and God leads them to a non-Christian landlord who rents the house at less than half market value. No venue for the church to meet in? No problem. They pray and go to an absolutely beautiful facility which doesn’t rent to churches and is very expensive. After a brief conversation with the manager, he decides to rent them the facilities, and at less than half the going rate. Immigration issues? No problem, they pray and at the very last minute God gives them the documentation to stay in the country. Need a building for a 24-hour house of prayer? No problem, they pray and God sends them to a Jewish businessman who renovates a damaged building in a strategic location at great expense and then rents it to them, complete with large meeting room, storage area, beautiful kitchen, foyer and washrooms, for less than $400 a month. Need more people for a church plant? They pray, and a couple comes because God sends a visiting speaker from the other end of the country totally unfamiliar with local churches into a church service they are attending who walks up to them and says one word, which is the name of the church plant! Can’t afford a house to live in? They pray, and God gives them a completely gutted and renovated house when the vendor decides to knock $60,000 off the selling price. Got a small church but desperate for a place to meet? They pray and put an offer in on the city hall. This one’s in progress, but I have a feeling the mayor is on his way out the door!

At the end of the trip, we realized there was a cumulative effect to being around all these people. Our faith was increased and our vision was expanded. And at our last stop, we received a commissioning from very dear friends to move into a new place where God will do great things.

And I want to add one important detail. These are people taking massive steps of faith and common-sense defying risks because they felt God told them to in order to extend his kingdom. They are not people with a couple of expensive cars in the garage and lots of money in a pension plan. They are out on a limb for God. And God is meeting them.

Coming home, I was sitting in the car praying, and asking the Lord to fuel my faith and feed my vision. He can do that in many ways, but one of the ways is to be around people of faith and vision.

Those of us in Christian leadership wind up giving out a fair bit to folk who really need our help, and that’s the business we’re in. But often we forget that we also need to be fed. That happens, obviously, as we pray, read the Bible and worship. But it also happens through the company we keep.

Facing some big steps of faith ourselves, I felt God sent all these brothers and sisters into our lives at just the right time. We received far more than we gave.

Nothing much is accomplished for the kingdom by people unwilling to risk their personal comfort and financial security. Who needs faith when you can do it yourself?

I want to be found in the company of those risking everything.

Because that’s where miracles are found.

Sarah Galloway: Incomplete but in complete

Today's post is by Sarah Galloway.

Are you discouraged? Are you weary? Are you simply still and stagnant in your faith? Have you been suffering?

I have been all these things and more. It leads me to ask constant questions of life and of God.

Why is this happening? When will it stop?

In late 2013 I woke up on a consultation floor blissfully unaware that the life I had known and loved had been broken beyond repair. The moment passed and I remembered. Shocking things, unimaginably strange and scary things that would haunt me in flash backs for years to come.

Psychosis is not an experience that is easy to describe. But it is a categorically bad experience.

Attempted suicide, in some cases very nearly successful suicide, is not an experience that is easy to live alongside. But it is a categorically bad experience.

Memory loss both short and long term is easier to describe - it’s like living in a fog and a constant state of surprise. I’ve got nothing to anchor myself to, it affects my identity as well as my ability. It too is a bad experience.

Seeing your life and the lives of those you love sucked in around you because of this invisible illness, this disease that works like a black hole drawing in the light and life and resources is a scary thing.

The uncertainty of everything has been the hardest burden to bear. Many times I have come to God with the simple prayer ‘Make it stop, make it stop.’

But it didn’t and it hasn’t. I still suffer from a form of encephalitis whereby the body attacks the brain. I can’t work, I can’t cook, I can’t live alone, I can’t concentrate, I can’t control my emotion... in fact let's go to the can do list, as that is shorter. I can eat. I can sleep. I can paint. And I can pray.

So what is it that keeps me going? What’s the driving force? What has God taught me through this suffering? A very simple thing. I have learned that I don’t always need to learn something through my suffering. Some things are bad and wrong and grieve God’s heart as well as mine. Some things steal from you. Some things break you. And that’s ok.

I can rest and not stress about finding that silver lining, or finding more faith. If I can’t feel God’s presence in the middle of my struggle I know that’s just another form of theft; it’s not my fault that it happened and it’s not my job to fix. There is such relief in this way of thinking and being before God.

Suffering draws you into the immediate, the now, the moment of pain. God works through the big picture, the journey, the long haul. I might not win this battle, I may yet suffer psychotic episodes, I may yet feel so low that life is too much. But I know the real battle is won.

I don’t have to strive, or struggle, or suffer under suffering. I can lean into God and rest. I can find that feast amid fear, that sleep through the storm and that resistance against temptation. God has given me an identity and an inheritance that no sickness, sin or suffering can touch, not even death. So in my incomplete, disease ridden life I can be in complete and hope ridden faith.

What happens when the preaching dies?

In church circles I move in, we talk all the time about Word and Spirit. And I often wonder whether we really know what we are talking about. Has it become just a phrase without a lot of meaning?

The first problem is this. Why are Word and Spirit presented as two separate entities? Think about it for a minute.

We talk about having Word and Spirit churches as if we’ve achieved a wonderful situation where we have the best of all possible worlds.

But why then, I ask, is the preaching in many churches so unsatisfying?

It’s probably because we’ve separated the Word and the Spirit.

Let me explain.

In his commentary on 2 Corinthians 3, John Calvin made the point that nobody can understand the Word of God without a revelation of the Spirit of God.

Do preachers cry out to God for a revelation of the Holy Spirit every time they prepare a Biblical exposition? Does the Holy Spirit fill their hearts and minds with divine illumination as they study the text? Does he give them ways to make the Biblical text powerfully applicable to the people to whom they are speaking? Do they preach with fire in their belly? Do they so pour themselves out they feel drained at the end?

Or are they just giving nice talks and with minimal effort and preparation?

And think about this one thought. How many preachers believe for a divine and supernatural moving of the Holy Spirit as they are preaching?

Charismatics are great at believing God to move during a great time of worship, or as people come forward for ministry or prayer afterwards.

But they are lousy at believing God to move as they preach.

Part of the reason is because they fail to put the high value on the preaching of the Word that God says we should. They fail to prepare adequately. They think 15 or 20 minutes of seeker-sensitive superficiality is enough for God to say what he wants.

And then they say they believe in Word and Spirit churches.

No.

Not good enough.

Listen to what Paul says: We are stewards of the mysteries of God.

And listen again: the job of the preacher is to bring to light for everyone what is the plan of the mystery hidden for ages in God.

And how is this mystery made known? By the Spirit.

Read 2 Corinthians 4 and Ephesians 3 right though and ask God for understanding.

So what do I get out of all this?

Very simply this: that the Word of God is a mystery which can only be made clear by a revelation of the Spirit which comes to the preacher and then comes to the people through his preaching of the Word.

We need churches where the Holy Spirit invades the heart of the preachers and teachers, pours revelatory understanding of the Word into them, and makes the Word a sword so powerful it does the job it was designed to do and cuts to the very heart of those listening, convicting and encouraging and changing them as they listen.

Preaching is not meant to be an academic lecture. Nor is it meant to be a collection of nice thoughts. And it is certainly not meant to be a brief afterthought to worship.

Preaching grasps a weapon so powerful that it may hurt you if you misuse it. Preaching is taking hold of divine fire. But first that fire must consume the heart of the preacher.

When that begins to happen, we will have the kind of reformation Calvin saw, where the Word, set on fire by the Spirit, changed the course of history.

Let’s believe God for churches where the Spirit of God, through imperfect earthen vessels, uses the Word of God to accomplish the purposes of God.

And that is where the fire will fall.