As soon as I saw it, I knew we needed to put it in our nursery. As you can see, it is green, a lovely, gender-neutral color and a key shade in my mental design plans. But more importantly, is the Scripture that is written on it. Ecclesiastes 3:11, which reads, "He has made everything beautiful in its time."
This is a piece of Scripture I have been hanging on to over the last few months, mainly because this one sentence contains two promises. First, it tells us that God will make all things beautiful. That is such a glorious promise from our Lord. How gracious of Him to provide us with this assurance, something we can cling to when things are not so beautiful. For example, when I look at my life right now, I don't always feel like it is beautiful. We are waiting, and I am not a very graceful waiter. My waiting is kind of ugly sometimes. There are tears, doubts, angry moments. And in those moments, I am so grateful to God for His promise to make all things beautiful. That means that I will not always be in this ugly waiting phase. God will turn this into something beautiful.
The second promise in this verse is a little different. The verse begins by telling us that God will make all things beautiful, and it ends by telling us that that will happen in His time. Hmmm. That is not always what we want to hear, right? If you are like me, then there are times (a lot of them) when you might be tempted to think that doing things in your time would be much better. Sadly, that is not the case. God's timing is always, always, always better than ours. Even when it really doesn't feel like it. I'll be honest; there are a lot of days when I think that waiting to bring our child home is a terrible idea. I think it would be much better if we just marched our little selves right on over to Ethiopia and handled our business. BUT, I know in my heart that that is not the best thing. How do I know that? Because I know God is sovereign. That is a very churchy word. But what I mean by it is that God knows everything that is going to happen for all eternity. More than that, He has ordained these future events to happen. He has the long view. I don't. I can only see today. And really, I can't even see all of today. But God can. And that means that He has chosen, created, formed a child specifically for us. He has picked us to be that baby's parents. He knows when we need to come together as a family. And all of those things will happen in a way and in a time that will be for our good and for God's glory.
So, for those reasons, I can trust that God will fulfill His promise to make all things beautiful. I know He will do it. I don't know how or when, but I do know that it will happen. He has promised me that. And He has promised you that. Are you sitting in the middle of a difficult time in your life? A time that doesn't feel so beautiful? God will make it beautiful. It might not be in the way or the time that you want, but what He does will be what is best for you.
God allows us to go through some not-so-beautiful times. And it can be easy to think that He is just being mean or that He doesn't care or even that He doesn't love us anymore. Those things are not true. The longer this adoption takes, the longer I wait to be a mom, the longer my heart physically hurts with this longing, the more I depend on God, the more I come to know Him and His beautiful character. And that, I am convinced, is a big part of His plan in all of this. Absolutely, it hurts right now. And I would love for it to be over, but I am starting to see why God is allowing it. He is drawing me closer to Him. He is getting me to a place where I can no longer rely on myself or anyone else to help me. There is not a human being on the face of this earth who can solve this problem for me. Only God can. And I think that realization is what He wants from me. So while He is working to make our family beautiful in His time, He is also making my relationship with Him more beautiful at this time. I know God so much more now than I did even 6 months ago. That is something I would not have had if everything happened on my timetable. God's timetable is multifaceted and multipurpose. He is doing so much more than we can see. All the time. Let's praise Him for that, for His faithfulness and commitment to us, even when we do not offer the same to Him in return.
So in light of all of this, I want to encourage you (and myself) to pray more. Seek God more. Study the Word more. All of these things will strengthen your relationship with Him, your faith in Him and your belief that He is who He says He is and will do what He says He will do. He will make all things beautiful.
"He has made everything beautiful in its time." Ecclesiastes 3:11
Love,
Baylor
You know what I see? One day my beautiful daughter-in-law is going to be home with a precious little one from Ethiopia and He knows how many more (!), and during their nap times she is going to be writing her latest article or blog for a ladies' devotion magazine or book! Think of His timing...English major, yearning to be a mom, learning while waiting, teaching while waiting! I'm very proud of you and cannot wait to hold that little one either. Your children will be so well rounded...farm knowledge from one set of grandparents and the awesomeness of the ocean/beach from their South Florida grandparents! And all of this waiting is going to equip you with so much to share with that special little one of how his/her path was mapped out to land in the Knott home. In His Time...
ReplyDeleteJoAnne, this is one of the sweetest things I have ever had anyone say. Thank you so much. I count it an enormous blessing that my children will have you as a grandmother.
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