God’s timing is an important aspect of walking with Him. To live a surrendered life, we must trust God’s timing. The Lord is the master of time, and just as He has the power to keep the sun, the moon, and the galaxies in proper order and timing, He also directs His children’s steps according to His timing and His will.
Then Jesus said to them, “My time has not yet come, but your time is always ready. The world cannot hate you, but it hates Me because I testify of it that its works are evil. You go up to this feast. I am not yet going up to this feast, for My time has not yet fully come.” When He had said these things to them, He remained in Galilee. John 7:6-9
The Lord sent Jesus at the right time in history to save humanity from sin and hell, but that did not mean that Jesus could do the work of ministry independent from God and His timing. Jesus still had to be in tune with the Lord’s timing as to where to go, who to minister to, and when to allow His ministry to go public.
As we see in the above passage, there was pressure and expectation for Jesus to do what others thought it was a good idea for Him to do. Furthermore, the majority of people including Jesus’ brothers lived in ignorance of God’s timing. Jesus, on the other hand, didn’t even want to go to a feast apart from the Lord’s timing for He knew there was a right time for His ministry to go public.
People tend to live their lives with their natural senses, and they do things when they want to do them. They think just because they have a desire to do it, then it must be the right time. The truth is that purpose and timing go hand-in-hand, and we should not assume because God has purposed to do something, it can be done at any time we choose. We need to live our lives surrendered to His timing. Some moments may feel so right, but they may not be God’s timing. At other times, something may seem inconvenient to us, but it is God’s timing.
There was a situation that I wanted to deal with recently, but my husband thought that I should wait. I was a bit annoyed, but I have learned that if my husband is telling me this, I need to pay attention to it. The opportunity ended up not presenting itself, and I did not seek to pursue it. A couple of weeks later, through a series of events, the right opportunity came about. We were both on the same page on how to handle it, and at the right time, we were able to discuss the matter with the right person. In addition, the Lord showed us that He had been working on the issue behind the scene. The entire matter was handled more effectively than if I had handled it in my timing.
The enemy tempts people to think that they may miss out on an opportunity if they don’t act right away. The key to trusting God’s timing is recognizing this fear and not giving in to it. How many times have you missed out on something when you were truly trusting God with His timing!? Sometimes people are being aloof and passive, and they procrastinate from doing what they should be doing. That is not God, and we cannot make it look like a surrendered life. That is just making excuses for the disobedience. However, if we genuinely want to know the will of God and be in tune with His timing, the Lord is merciful and will lead us in the right direction. We don’t have to be afraid of missing out and taking matters into our own hands.
The Lord sees things in multiple dimensions. He has a greater plan than what we perceive. He is working things out not only in our lives but also in others’ lives. Living a surrendered life is not always comfortable, but the Lord will bless us with His peace, joy, and contentment when we live a surrendered life.
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