Getting ahead of God

My niece got married last week and she wanted to have a picnic at our farm the following day to celebrate with her new Phoenix family and DC law students. 

My mom and dad worked relentlessly. Let me tell you Martha Stewart has got nothing on my mom. They returned from a trip a few weeks ahead and everyone kicked into high gear. Planting, pruning, watering, cleaning; the whole staff took part.

As each day clicked off toward the big event, we stressed that flowers were dropping leaves and shriveling. They should have been fully grown and thriving in the favorably mild and wet summer.

At the party, my father apologized that he had treated the flower beds with fertilizer to help them along. The only ones that survived were the flowers he missed.

Isn't that just like us with God?

Fertilizer is a good thing, but too much at the wrong time and growth stops.

I can think of many times I've done the same thing. I've given my daughter good advice, but too much at the wrong time and growth stops.

We are working through business restructuring right now. We needed answers two months ago. Some decisions or non-decisions seem wrong to people.

It reminds me of Gideon. If it had been me God told to go into battle with a candle, a jar and an instrument to blow hot air through I can hear myself now, excuse me God do you not understand the size of this problem? Guess I don't understand what small faith and how little patience I have.

I told a friend yesterday, sometimes those who wait on the Lord sweat bullets.

Do you feel like that? Are you sweating bullets waiting for answers?

The world looks up to people who can make things happen. They are the movers and the shakers. They know how to get things done.  That doesn't mean we have to come in with our fertilizer. We can do a lot of good things, we can make a lot of good decisions.

But too much of our own efforts at the wrong time and growth stops. God can't work.

I remain confident of this: 

I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. 

Wait for the Lord; 

be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord.

Psalm 27:13-14

But for us who call God our Lord, no decision is greater than letting God work in His time and His way.

I encourage you today to resist the small faith, little patience urge to fertilize.
There is richness waiting.
The soil and the seed God is preparing will be a thing of beauty.

Take heart.

Don't get ahead of God. You might miss the beauty.