It’s not my nature to be late for anything. I struggle with it. It’s as if to say if I arrive on time for everything in my life, all is obviously right in my world. Right? Wrong. Very wrong. But I can at least pretend for that day of punctuality that I’m okay.
So for this entire week, I’ve awoken at 3 a.m. and 5 a.m. multiple days. I hear the Holy Spirit speak, “Get up, I have something to say to you.” And rather than get up, I would lie in bed awake, in frustration with my body that loved the feeling of the covers against my skin and drift in and out of sleep; only to wake up a few hours later feeling as if I’d been beaten, with every joint in my body aching. So this morning at 3 a.m. when I heard to Holy Spirit speak again, I snuggled back beneath the covers, had a nutty dream and heard Him speak again at 5. Just like the past week every day. So at 5 a.m. I determined to get up and listen. But by the time I rallied myself up and made it to the kitchen it was 5:20.
Twenty minutes late for God…
That too is my nature. I’m not late for the world, but I’m late for divine appointments on a consistent basis and for multiple reasons and excuses.
Twice this week, two different very close friends ask me how I “really was.” They ask me hard questions that examined me like a spiritual physician and I knew they were warnings from God that I once again needed to slow myself down and take some pressure off. Doggone those people who love you.
Did I listen? I tried. But life has a way of getting you to the point that you’re 20 minutes late for an appointment with God. And that’s not good. Nobody makes God wait without consequences.
My mind went to Jonah, and his very own book. A look into the life of a man who tried to make God wait. But God didn’t lead me to that scripture, He lead me to Luke, chapter 12.
12:35-36
Let your loins be girded about, and your lights burning. And ye yourselves like unto men that wait for their lord, when he will return from the wedding: that when he cometh and knocketh, they may open unto him immediately.”
IN HIS PRESENCE
The scripture refers to the return of Jesus Christ, when He comes to call His church home. But it could just as easily refer to any time the Lord knocks and requests us in His presence. Like 3 a.m. wake up calls.
BY HIS PETITION
12:37
Blessed are those servants, whom the lord when he cometh shall find watching: very I say unto you, that he shall gird himself, and make them to sit down to meat, and will come forth and serve them.
My mind is humbled at the very thought that the Lord would serve me. And yet He does when He speaks to my soul and ministers to my broken spirit. He’d had sent angels of mercy in the form of friends who gently warned… “Rest.”
He Himself had not tried to wake me to steal my rest, but rather give me rest through His word. And yet I refused to listen but rather drift back into a restless sleep. Until today. And though I was twenty minutes late, He was still right on time to give me the message that I needed to hear to calm my troubled heart.
FOR MY PORTION
12:42-43
And the Lord said, Who then is that faithful and wise steward, whom his lord shall make ruler over his household, to give them their portion of meat in due season? Blessed is that servant, whom his lord when he cometh shall find so doing.
I weep in the wisdom that the Lord provides my portion in due season. Which often time comes later because I didn’t answer the door when He was prepared to make the delivery.
It came late this week because I kept failing to answer the door. I studied this week out of necessity of teaching opportunities. Not for personal portions. It’s like savoring the goodness of someone else’s plate as you deliver it to their table. Never experiencing the food for yourself. I wonder how many Pastor’s experience that.
This morning the Lord and I dined over frosted mini wheats and coffee and the word of God. It tasted so good! And the mini wheats were pretty tasty too.
A lesson in life from the Jesus Chick… when God knocks, open yourself to opportunity.