Wow, what a crazy couple of months. It all started out with a message that was stirring in my heart in response to an exegetical sermon assignment we had for school back at the beginning of Second Semester. My message is called: Anticipating the goodness of God regardless of season or circumstance. In summation, it is centred on Psalm 27:13, where David is able to declare in the midst of warfare, threat, betrayal and despair, an unflinching confidence in seeing the manifestation of God's goodness in the midst of those situations. David's life, in this Psalm, to me, is the perfect illustration of how we experience what we anticipate. Or what we anticipate, we experience.
Talk about testing coming to the word given or the word received. Shortly after I preached on that and how I felt in the midst of cultivating anticipation of God's goodness even when all hell is breaking loose, and how God wanted to release a supernatural ability to hope for His Goodness, some unique challenges arose in my life that were testing my word.
My faithful 1993 Subaru legacy died on me. I was sad that it had been such a short lived legacy of my owning my wee car. It was going to cost more to fix the car than it was worth, and not only that, there was very little chance that anyone would actually compensate me for parts from the car. As you can imagine, this was sad news to receive. Instantly, I started to think "how on earth am I going to have a life without a car to get around in? How am I going to get to school and do my relationships without transportation?" Anxiety set in. I was snowboarding that day and after getting off the phone to hear of the bad car news, I grabbed two friends who were up on the mountain also and asked them to pray for me. When they finished praying this is what came out of my mouth: "God I thank you for this opportunity to anticipate your goodness in this situation!"
2 Days later, I had a new car. And a seriously upgraded one at that-a 2009 Kia Spectra, thanks to the generousity and love of amazing grandparents. I couldn't believe how powerful an illustration this was of experiencing what you anticipate.
About a month later, I end up in hospital with a ruptured appendix, which I do not recommend. This has taken me out of school for 2weeks and meant I couldn't go on my missions trip to England which I had been having dreams about since last summer. Disappointment definitely set in. Another uncertainty also arose recently in my life that is challenging me to declare in the midst of these seemingly lost opportunities "God thank you for this moment to increase my capacity to anticipate and hope in your goodness being made manifest in these areas of my life. You are always good".
I started thinking about this some more and decided that I really have such an amazing opportunity with these challenging circumstances to lean into Him and develop an even firmer, more concrete conviction of just how good He is. Thus, my grid for what is true only increases and strengthens. That is so good!
On reflecting on Psalm 27 and how David responds in the midst of extreme difficulty and discouragement, I love what he states in another bible translation of verse 13: I would have fainted had I not hoped to see the goodness of God in the land of the living. One of the products of anticipating God's goodness, is hope and strength. David confesses without hoping to see God's goodness invade his current circumstances he would have caved under the pressure of the afflictions. He would have given up and succumbed to disappointment and heartache. And so, as I anticipate and hope in His goodness invading my disappointments, I am being strengthened and reinforced to press past the craziness and uncertainty of what confronts me. Strength is being released to me to overcome what lies in front, that I might taste and see that the Lord is good and that He has good plans for my life, which are for my well being and prosperity. Let hope arise in your challenging situations. Anticipate His goodness, knowing that it is His will that mercy and goodness stalk you all the days of your life. They never leave you alone! He wants to set us up for victory so badly! Psalm 23 tells us that he prepares a table before us in the presence of our enemies. Wow. Despite being surrounded by conflict and challenge, God has a place for us in that moment where we can be nourished, nurtured, energised and strengthened. Its a place of feasting and banqueting, showing that no matter what difficulty or disappointment confronts us, we can still find a place of joy and gladness in Him, simply by hoping in His goodness and then experiencing the manifestation of that which we have anticipated. Can you see how good He is?
Thank you God for this amazing season and these unique situations in my life to be stretched in new levels to anticipate your goodness invading these specific areas. You are always good.
