“In his heart a man plans his course, but the Lord determines his steps.” (Proverbs 16:9)

My last Blog was over two weeks ago…and I don’t feel guilty one bit about it!  One thing I have had to learn is, it may get quiet at times but things are always happening in the throne room of God!

I don’t know about you but my nature is to plan and go, then asking God to join me.  One major problem with this; I am the child and He is the Father so I really ought to be causing myself to get into a spiritual and physical willingness of joining Him rather than asking Him to join me!  That’s called “living in His rescue”, not “living in His will”!  That’s really what prayer is anyway…it’s not as much about asking as it is getting the “ask” to come into agreement with God’s will for me and the things he has called me to participate in.  Now, as an expert in jumping the gun and making things happen (all in the name of Jesus so they are spiritual looking and sounding), I say this is where we all think the answer from God was “No” when the actual answer was “Give me time”!  But we did it anyway and found it confusing and very costly in the end…thus the “rescue”!

Why can’t we allow ourselves the time God is wanting us to take for Him to orchestrate, confirm, change, clarify, correct or even save us from disaster, before we launch off because we want something so bad?  Not just cars, vacations and homes…even ministry too!  This is a great quote, “For us time is of the essence.  For God, time is essential.”(Chris Tiegreen).  What a sad day it would be to see all I missed in the end result because I didn’t seek the Lord, allowing Him time to work and change me or deliver His provision rather than mine!  And, how great the cost was that I and others bore because I did it without God!    Oh, and for the record…there will ALWAYS be a good deal out there…leaving the store and praying, giving God time to work never cost anyone a penny…but saved them more than just dollars!

Marti and I have made some major plans for 2013 in two nations, Brazil and Cabo Verde, West Africa. We have scheduled 4 specific dates to deploy teams for 11 day intervals over 4 months to train these nations to reach and train others to reach and train others, causing a rapid movement of the Gospel message and discipleship infrastructure that will birth church plants all over neighborhoods, villages, rural towns and cities that never make the “mission sheets” because they are so small….but as critical to reach as major cities.

We believe our plans are joining God in what He is doing BUT before we published these aggressive plans, we had to take them before the Lord, asking for Him to change, add, combine…and yes, even erase one or all of those plans!  It’s hard when you are entrepreneurial in your thinking and drive but we had to place them before the Lord in such a way that it was not about us, but about Him.

In the last two weeks, I have had some of the hardest days with productivity in my field training material writing, support raising, an illness that caused tremendous pain and no sleep for 5 days.  Plus the normal sin pattern battles to bash through daily and the decision making that goes along with a wife, 4 children, 2 sons in law and 3 grand babies!  No lightening bolts showed up with a note attached that said “GO” during this time BUT today, we are at complete and utter peace we are joining God in His work, not creating our own.  I fully know this, I may have planned out 2013 but God will bring to be what He wants..it’s how He works.  I also know that I will look back from the end of 2013 and see a much different picture than the one I hoped to paint before it all started.  But, I am so glad to give God the time He wants to work ahead of me so I am following Him.

This Blog isn’t about waiting, it’s about giving God the time He deserves and allowing ourselves to have a heart and mind that can be changed to align ourselves with Him.