Every year, I read through the full Bible and try to make at least one note every day of something that jumps out at me, something that hits my heart. I always try to journal something I haven't journaled before, to pick something new out of each day's reading instead of falling back on the same old things all the time. I'm writing these reflections from the notes I made two years ago (yes, it's taking me that long to reflect on them and put them into the form that I want), and as I came to today's reflection, I realized that just this morning - this exact morning - I made the exact same note from the exact same verse in my journal.
Maybe that means I'm always in a similar place this time of year, that the same verse would jump out at me in the same way. Maybe I'm always in this place, and this verse just hits like fresh water on a hot day every time I come across me. Maybe God just wants me to pay special attention to this verse for some reason that I have yet to figure out.
Whatever it is, this is the verse and this is the note:
God does not allow pain without birth. (Isaiah 66:9)
The actual verse says something like, would God bring you to the pain of a birth and then not deliver?
Of course, we know that in the real world, this very thing does sometimes happen. It happens more than we want it to. We go through all the pain of growing and developing and coming to new life, only to have it falter at the implementation stage. Only to have something go wrong. Only to not quite get to where we thought we were headed.
But we have vernacular for this in our church lingo, and it goes something like this: it feels like Friday, but Sunday's a-comin'.
Because in our heart of hearts, we believe this. We believe that it's not over until it's good and if it's not good, it's not over. We believe that God doesn't bring us through all the pain of labor and not deliver us. We believe that when the promise of new life is before us, when we can feel it in our loins, when we have it aching in our hearts, it's coming. For real. For sure.
God hasn't brought us this far to only bring us this far.
We haven't gone through this just to go through it, but to grow through it. New life is coming.
That's harder to believe in some seasons than in others. It's harder to hold onto sometimes. It's hard to let it sink into our hearts when that first drop hits so hollow in this empty place that feels like it's been waiting for too long and that echo...oh, that echo of hope as it hits like that...it's almost too much to bear. You can start feeling like everything that's been growing in you is about to be stillborn, like you're never going to hear that cry of new life that you've been waiting oh, so long to hear. Like maybe it's not new life you've been growing after all, but something more like a kidney stone - something that's just supposed to pass.
Friends, no. For God has not giving us a spirit of kidney stones, but of new life - and life abundant. He's growing in us something good, and He's bringing it not to pass, but to be. Delivery is just around the corner, and all of this pain...it's gonna be worth it. It might feel like Friday - or as I've found is more often the case in my life, Saturday - but Sunday is a-comin'. It is. You've got to believe it.
And if right now, you're in a place where you can't believe it, know this: I am believing it for you. Because I've seen it too much to believe any different. So just hold on.
Would God bring you this far, in this much pain, with this much trouble, and not deliver you?
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