Greetings, Dear Friends!
Susie Larson here...

And to those visiting, I say welcome! I post every Wednesday and my sole purpose is to nourish your soul.

Last month I mentioned that if you post on my blog you would be eligible for a $10.00 Caribou gift card. Well, that was so much fun, I've decided to give away two gift cards for the month of January!

Drum roll please...

Kathy Peterson and Rebecca Marshaw - you are the proud winners of a $10.00 gift card from Caribou; sure to keep you warm during this blustery winter season.

Please email me at: info@susielarson.com and let me know where I should send your card.

For February let's give away either a $10.00 Caribou card or a $10.00 Target card - your choice.

It blesses my heart to no end to hear from you. This journey can be a lonesome road and it always encourages me to know you're out there.

Now on to my topic.

The other morning, I was reading the 32nd chapter of Exodus. Moses was up on the mountain having a face to face encounter with God. His followers hadn't heard from him in a while and they got bored waiting for him.

Let's look in at their response:

When the people saw how long it was taking Moses to come back down the mountain, they gathered around Aaron. "Come on," they said, "make us some gods who can lead us. We don't know what happened to this fellow Moses, who brought us here from the land of Egypt."

This fellow?

Moses risked his life to secure their freedom. God used Moses to preform mighty miracles on their behalf. Moses wasn't just a fellow, he was the one God used to save them.

Moses' journey with the Israelites very much parallels Christ's journey with us.

And with that in mind, I noticed three things about the Israelites' reaction to Moses' delay:

Impatience with God's plan.
Minimizing God's place in their lives.
A willingness to default to idol worship.

And we do the very same thing.

We just have to look back over our shoulder to see some of the mighty ways God has moved on our behalf. We don't have to think too far back to recall the times He has met us and spoke directly to our hearts. Our faith is encouraged when we remember the ways God has come through for us when we needed Him most.

And yet, when we are asked to wait longer than we want for the thing He has promised, we get impatient, and we wonder about plan B. We are very quick to make a back up plan when God takes too long to come through for us.

Wouldn't God appreciate a little help on our part to, you know, hurry the plan along?

I mean He has the whole galaxy to manage, and well, this is just a little itty bitty thing to Him. Right?

Wrong.

Nothing is too hard for God, but that doesn't mean little things mean nothing to Him. He is the God of detail! Look at the butterfly, or the hummingbird, or the pedals of a flower. Try to wrap your brain around the human body! He loves detail and He is madly in love with us.

God is big. He is near. And He is intimately engaged in this journey with us. Even when He seems silent, He has a divinely wise purpose for being so.

His part in our journey is of ultimate importance to us. He hasn't forgotten us. He doesn't ever accidentally look away when we take our leaps of faith. He catches us when we jump. He lifts us up when we stumble. And when He makes us wait, it's because He's making us ready.

Our part is vitally important as well.

We must not think for a minute that He won't come through for us.

During the waiting season, we'll be tempted to get bored and lose heart. We'll be tempted minimize God's involvement in our process. And we'll be tempted to build a counterfeit with our own hands.

The time in between the promise and the realization of it, matters. Infinitely so.

The time in between shows us what we're made of.