*Super Late Posting* This was written a few months ago after writing part 1.

Right now my 3 year old daughter’s favorite bible story is the story of Joseph, she wants to listen to it, read it, and talk about it with me. I wrote about Joseph and his journey with the Lord (A Season of Waiting Part 1) a couple of months ago and OVER and OVER God has continued to bring it to the forefront of my mind (especially through my daughter), as well as the journey of others in the Bible, who walked through seasons of trial and waiting.

Abraham is another story of waiting for God to unfold His own plan in his own timing (and also of what it looks like when we try and control the future and take God’s promises into our own hands Genesis 15-21). And so we continue to pray and trust, knowing that God has different timing than our own. Psalm 130: 5-6 has been an encouragement to me “I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in his Word I hope; my soul waits for the Lord,” as well as a reminder to wait actively-to be in the Word and growing to know him better and to be faithful in the season he has us in.

Yet despite these things, I looked at this season as one where I choose to be content-but that the reward comes at the end of faithfully waiting. One Sunday morning in the beginning of December I was sitting in our church service next to Phil and the sermon felt as if it were directly for me. Our pastor was talking about seasons of waiting and he said, “We often think of the reward at the end of the wait…But what if doing life with God is the reward?”

It totally took my breath away for a minute. I so easily take for granted that I have access to the Holy Spirit each and every day. I don’t have to go a moment without the presence of the Lord and yet I so often want to look towards the future or what comes next. But what if living in the present, if doing life with God by our side is the reward?

Psalm 16:7-9 says, “I bless the Lord who gives me counsel; in the night also my heart instructs me. I have set the Lord always before me; because he is at my right hand, I shall not be shaken. Therefore, my heart is glad, and my whole being rejoices; my flesh also dwells secure.” The author doesn’t say that he rejoices because he was rewarded after a hard journey or after a period of waiting. No-he rejoices, because the Lord is always before him and at his right hand.

Our pastor didn’t just end with that first question, but he also asked: “What happens if God says to you, ‘No, I won’t give you that. But I am offering you myself.’ Will you be disappointed? Or are you willing to put hope in God and his will whatever it may be?” This is something I have grappled with over the last year. As we wait for God to expand our family, will I be okay if God’s answer isn’t just wait…but might possibly be No? It’s incredibly hard for me to let go of the desire of wanting a big family…but shouldn’t doing life with God be my ultimate desire?

I don’t know if you are in a season of waiting or what kind of loss or unmet desire you may be walking through. And I’m not saying you shouldn’t pray for those things or have hope for something for the future. I know I still do. But what if we allow ourselves to become so focused on God that He is our reward? Horacio Spafford wrote the hymn, “It is Well with My Soul”, after losing most of his investments and losing his 4 daughters on a voyage at sea. I cannot imagine the pain and loss that He was walking through. Maybe your own story identifies more with his then, my own…

But can we give our waiting, our desires, our pains to the Lord and declare that it is well?

“When peace like a river, attendeth my way

When sorrows like see billows roll

Whatever my lot, thou hast taught me to say

It is well, it is well, with my soul.”

My heart often cries out these words even when I am hurting and confused. I pray that you also can ask God for this peace, to walk with him in this journey, and to have hope for the future simply because He will be with us in the future no matter what else it may hold. And that we can each say, “But I will hope continually and will praise you yet more and more!” (Psalm 71: 14).