"Just keep believing, you'll see a new season soon, you're turning into something amazing, baby, you were born to bloom."
Have you ever had an encounter that was so divine and timely, that you knew it had to be straight from God?
I did fairly recently, when I attended a concert. After showing my ticket and heading to my seat, I was abruptly stopped by a young man who seemingly appeared out of nowhere. He smiled timidly as he explained that he saw me walking and felt like God had told him to stop and take a few minutes to pray for me.
This was something new to me. I'd been approached for prayer before, but normally it was at church around familiar faces--never by a random guy in the middle of a crowded hallway. Still, never wanting to turn down the opportunity for prayer--especially if God had told him to do it--I accepted.
We briefly shook hands and exchanged names as he asked me if there was anything on my heart I'd like prayer for. I stewed in thought for several moments, trying to think of something more important than what I knew I was supposed to say. You'd think this would be easy, say something, pray and move on with life. But deep down, something in me knew this prayer was different. Something in me knew that God had ordained this little meeting, and wanted me to share exactly what was on my heart.
"I don't know where I'm going," I laughed nervously. He seemed confused by my response, not knowing if I was talking about the prayer or if I was legitimately lost inside the concert venue.
"I feel like God is leading me into a new season," I continued. "I feel like a lot of changes are on the way--good changes, I just don't know what they are yet. I don't know where I'm going or how I'm getting there, but as crazy at it sounds, I'm not worried about it. I actually feel really excited, like everything that's happening is a part of something bigger God had planned for me. I guess that would be my prayer."
I felt embarrassed after spilling my heart so openly. This was a thought that had been bubbling inside my head for weeks, and I hadn't yet told anyone. I almost expected him to laugh directly in my face and walk away, yet what he did next surprised me. He placed a hand on my shoulder, slowly nodded, and with a look of pure compassion, said, "I completely understand."
He spent the next few moments praying with me, asking God to give me direction and peace about where He was leading me, and that was it. We quickly said goodbye and went our separate ways back into the show. It was one of the most bizarre and amazing moments of my entire life. Yet, as crazy as the whole situation was, I think what shocked me the most was that I finally had the courage to say what I'd been dying to say for so long: "I don't know."
Change is a funny thing. Either you love it or you hate it. Some people fight change with everything in them. They hate the idea that nothing can stay the same. And then there are those who are addicted to change. People who start a whole new life every six months, and when the weight of their decisions start to get a little too heavy, they pack up and begin all over again.
I remember after I had become a Christian, sitting in church one Sunday and hearing my Pastor give a message on the changing of seasons. The only seasons I knew of were Spring, Summer, Winter and Fall… were there more I wasn't aware of?
Naive in my understanding, I sat there for next hour, soaking up every word he had to say. He spoke about how seasons are much like those four periodic times of the year. They come, leave their mark, and then go, ushering in yet another new season. When someone is single, that's a season in their life. When they get married, it's another season. Changing jobs, moving to a new house, having kids, they're all seasons. A season, in a way, is just fancy way of saying "life changes."
I've faced my fair share of "seasons" in the years since I've discovered their meaning; some great and some not-so-great. One thing I've experienced out of all of them however, is growth. In the good seasons, I've been able to taste and see God's faithfulness, and in the hard ones, I've been able to feel His presence guiding me though and giving me peace.
Several months back, I felt a strong sense that God was preparing me for a new season. The only thing was that I didn't know what, where or why. I didn't know for what He was preparing me, where He was leading me or why I was being led there in the first place. I just knew something new was on the way.
I began to feel really anxious and worried about what was to come. I'm big on organization and details. I need to know what I'm doing, why I'm doing it and how I'm getting there. I'm a bit of a control freak in that sense. And here was God, basically taking all control out of my hands and telling me to sit back and trust Him.
"Trust You for what?!" I'd think. "This whole 'trust' thing would be so much easier if I knew what You were up to!"
I went on living in this silent state of panic for several months. I believed God was working, but because I was so frustrated by not having any knowledge of what He was doing, I felt like I was never going to get there--wherever "there" was.
That was until, the night this quiet stranger came up and offered me five minutes of his time in prayer.
Something shifted in my walk with God that night. I think it finally broke through to me: I'm not supposed to know what God is doing. If I knew what He was doing, it wouldn't cause me to have faith. It wouldn't cause me to trust Him or believe He was going to do what He said He was going to do. It's almost like getting a good book; it's not as fun to read when you skip to the last few pages and see how it ends. The journey lies in how the story unfolds.
In the weeks following this life-changing encounter, God gave me a scripture, Isaiah 43:19. It says, "For I am about to do something new. See, I have already begun! Do you not see it? I will make a pathway through the wilderness. I will create rivers in the dry wasteland."
I love this because it reminds me that God will come through for me, He'll do what He says He'll do, and even when it looks like all hope is lost and I'm stuck living a life of mediocrity--that He can make a way where there is no way. He can take me farther than I can take myself.
There is a line in Moriah Peters' song, Bloom, that says, "I wish you could see you were made for more, and your wildest dreams can't compare to what God's got in store." I'm pretty sure I broke down in tears the first time I heard that. It's such a perfect representation of where I'm at in my journey.
I'm in a season where God is asking me to stretch my faith and believe Him for more than what I'm capable of. I'm in a season where God is leading me into something brand new, something unfamiliar, somewhere where I'm going to "bloom," but in order to get me there, He's asking me to stop trying to take control and run the situation--that will only end in a mess. He just wants me to trust Him, obey Him and watch Him do the rest.
Maybe you're like myself and you find yourself in an uncomfortable season of uncertainty. You don't know what's next and you don't know how you'll ever be where you want to be, I want to encourage you to let go of whatever control you think you have and give it over to God. In your own strength and understanding, you can only get so far, but when you finally surrender to the One who asks you to trust Him, you'll soon find that living in uncertainty, can be a very beautiful thing.
