Impatience

After doing some difficult spiritual work to wade through the sea of questions and find clarity in God's truth, I waited. And waited. I began to grow impatient with God's timing.

I was now moving out of ambitionless depression and back into my usual goal-oriented personality. What better goal could I have than to figure out how to have a baby? If there was a way for me to solve the pregnancy problem through logic, research, science, or simple creativity, I was going to find it! 

I was so much like Abraham in the Old Testament. God promises him countless descendants, but when the fulfillment of that promise seems impossible, Abraham takes matters into his own hands. He sleeps with his servant and has a child through her in an attempt to carry on his family line (Gen. 16). Taking the initiative seems like a positive character trait unless we use it to force our version of what we think God’s will should be, rather than waiting on His timing.

This waiting is not without purpose. It brings to mind the story of the potter and the clay in Jeremiah 18. There is only one way for a good creation to be molded into a better one. It must be completely destroyed, violently thrown onto the wheel once again, and then carefully shaped into the beautiful masterpiece that the artist has in mind. The process is painful, and it is difficult not to focus on the loss, because we can’t see the end result that God has in mind. Sometimes the transformation process of grief and waiting is the only way we can become who God intends us to be. Transformation takes time, and only God knows how long.