While We WaitPrøve

Author: Jenni Clayville In 2011, my family and I moved from Portland to be the Worship Pastor at a church plant in El Paso, Texas. We knew this wouldn’t be permanent, but we soon came to love it there. We found amazing friends and community. We had grown comfortable. However, I could feel God had something new brewing for us. Being in the unknown is uncomfortable for me. I’m a “planner.” If you look at my calendar, you’ll see things scheduled a year, maybe two, out. I wish I was joking. I felt stuck at the fork in the road not knowing what was next. The ever-popular verse, Jeremiah 29:11, says, “For I know the plans I have for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." We often miss the context around this verse. This whole passage talks about Israel being in exile for 70 years. Seventy! Only after those 70 years are completed would God’s promise be fulfilled to bring them back from exile. Then, there was a young shepherd boy, David, mentioned in 1 Samuel 16, who was anointed to become king of Israel. It took 20 years and 20 chapters (2 Samuel 5) until David was actually appointed king of Israel. In those 20 years, David served at the pleasure of an insecure and tyrannical king, faced assassination, ran and hid as a fugitive, was homeless and isolated, and was absolutely crushed. But in the waiting, God developed him to become the greatest King of Israel. We cannot confuse the appointing with the anointing . All of us are anointed. We’re all purposed with a calling, but for some of us, embracing today means we wait, train, listen, are crushed, become resilient, and get ready. Plans are important but so is prayer, listening, and waiting. We need to choose to embrace today, not tomorrow. There’s no way to be ready for today if we haven’t lived and waited through yesterday. What are you waiting on right now? How can you embrace today?