My All in All

It is very easy to go through life looking to and waiting for the next milestone or stage that awaits us...graduation, career, relationship, marriage, children, etc. For myself, I have discovered that there are two major problems with this.  First, it robs me of present joy.  When I was single, people would often tell me how sorry they were that I hadn't found someone yet.  I knew what they meant.  These were people who were married and were enjoying the amazing gift of marriage, and therefore wished me the same happiness.  However, without meaning to, the idea being conveyed to me was often that I was missing out. . . that until I was married, my life was less satisfying or incomplete.  Of course, this is far from true.  God doesn't make cookie cutter people and He doesn't have cookie cutter plans for us either.  So, anytime we look at someone else and compare ourselves with them - what they have, where they are, what they have accomplished - we rob ourselves of the present joy that God has given.  His perfect plans for each of us are unique and wonderful.  And often those plans mean that the milestones we are looking to and waiting for with great expectation may be delayed (according to our timetables) or may not be His best for us at all.  This doesn't mean we are missing out.  I can be satisfied and complete in the Giver of all good things.  While our greatest joy does await us in eternity, we can still find present and full joy where God has placed us now.  

The second problem I find with being so fixed on the milestones of this life is that they become our expectation.  Every major stage or life marker that I have come to thus far have one thing in common: they have never lived up to my high expectations of what they would be like and how they would make me feel.  I remember being in high school thinking of how I could not wait for senior year, and although I had a great senior year of high school, it certainly did not live up to the hype I had created in my mind.  The same could be said for college, starting my career, moving out on my own, and even getting married.  Let me be clear, marriage is wonderful. I love my husband and know that I am immensely blessed to have him in my life.  But marriage is far more sanctifying and stretching than I had anticipated.  You see, in our expectations, we rarely if ever think or speculate on the way we will be tried or our real, true, fleshly self will be exposed.  We tend to only dwell on the lighter, happier, or what we may term as "fulfilling" things that await us in that phase.  This is why soon after attaining the object of our exception, we move on to the next thing that we feel awaits us and will fulfill us.  The Psalms are an ever present call to us to make only one thing, one Person our expectation.  

Psalm 62:5 "My soul, wait thou only upon God; for my expectation is from Him."

Psalm 39:2 "With expectation I have waited for the Lord, and he was attentive to me."

There are plenty of other admonitions throughout Scripture that point us to Christ being the only one to fulfill all our needs, all our longings, all our desires.  No other person or thing can do that.  

Wherever you are right now, let me encourage you to be grateful - joyfully grateful for where you are.    If you are in Christ, you lack nothing.  And if and when God chooses to bring that next milestone that you are looking forward to, find all your satisfaction and joy in Him, the Giver of all good things.  (James 1:17)