His Time

This morning during my reading plan the phrase “His time had not yet come.” stuck out at me.  I can be impatient at times.  I like to think I have gotten better, but I was reminded of my short-comings in the area as I drove to brunch with my daughter and got behind a car traveling ten miles under the speed limit, with her phone visibly in her hand.  I didn’t slam on my horn, or speed around and past her, but I did ask who taught her to drive as she pulled parallel into a driveway without using her blinker right as we passed through a stoplight.  Then I promptly thanked God for getting her off the road before me.

And then there are things I am waiting on God for, clear words of instruction on things that He has promised.  Yes, I wait on Him, and at times through great peril, but really I am not very patient in my waiting.  Really what I would love for God to do, is more similar to the Burger King slogan “”My way, Right away.”  I think He should do things how I think they should be done, in my timing, but with His results of course.

There is vision He has given me, that I have full faith and trust that they will come to pass in my life.  However, there are times I question if I really heard from God because I am seeing very little movement in those areas.  Sometimes, He reminds me, and shows me that just because it doesn’t look like I thought it would – doesn’t mean He isn’t laying the groundwork for those promises to come to pass.

Time is mentioned 996 times throughout the Bible in different contexts.  Yet today, hearing those words “His time had not yet come” brought me peace.  No one had a more important mission on this earth than Christ.  Yet, even He was bound by time while on this earth.

His first miracle, He knew it wasn’t yet time for Him to step out in His glory.  Yet, in obedience to His mother, He turned water into wine to meet the needs of others.

John 2:4 “Dear woman, that’s not our problem,” Jesus replied. “My time has not yet come.”

There were also others in His life that tried to speed up His destiny.  However, they were unsuccessful because the timing was not right.

John 7:30  Then the leaders tried to arrest him; but no one laid a hand on him, because his time had not yet come.

John 8:20  Jesus made these statements while he was teaching in the section of the Temple known as the Treasury. But he was not arrested, because his time had not yet come.

Promises given were only fulfilled in God’s perfect timing.  The angel came to Zechariah and told him that his wife would give birth to John the Baptizer.  Zechariah questioned how and the angel responded:

Luke 1:20  But now, since you didn’t believe what I said, you will be silent and unable to speak until the child is born. For my words will certainly be fulfilled at the proper time.”

Jesus knew when His time had come.  He knew leading up to the Passover, that His time had come.  He knew that He was about to walk into destiny.  The time was right.

John 13:1  Before the Passover celebration, Jesus knew that his hour had come to leave this world and return to his Father. He had loved his disciples during his ministry on earth, and now he loved them to the very end.

Matthew 26:18 “As you go into the city,” he told them, “you will see a certain man. Tell him, ‘The Teacher says: My time has come, and I will eat the Passover meal with my disciples at your house.’”

I realize in these scriptures that God’s timing is perfect.  Sometimes He lets us walk in a moment before our time, because of a request to meet the needs of others.  Jesus stepped out at the request of others.  Maybe we haven’t been fully equipped for the plan and purpose He has for us, but there is a person who needs what we have right then.  And God’s glory shines through.

It doesn’t matter how much others wants to make something happen, to push me into my destiny.  God’s timing is perfect, and it will not come to pass until all the pieces of the puzzle of my life are in place for the masterpiece that He created me to be.  I can not be forced to walk in things before His time.

However, when God’s timing comes, no power in hell can stop what He wants to do in and through me.  I will know when I am walking in the complete fullness of what God wants to do in my life.  His glory will be revealed when that time comes, and everything will fall in to place as others will also understand the time has come.