Building Delays

Have you ever worked on a project either large or small and due to circumstances out of your control, you’ve been delayed during the process? Maybe you’ve ordered specialty tile or cabinets or you simply can’t find the paint color that seems just right. Maybe the contractor you’ve hired to help you got pulled away from your job due to things that were out of his control. It’s frustrating,right?

Well, we’ve been in a season of one delay after another for the last two months. Brian’s dad passed away on February 4^th and we were gone for a week in Connecticut. We came home, worked on catching back up on “normal” things in life (including this blog) and our friends’ ten year old son passed away two weeks after we said goodbye to Bri’s dad. We’ve had some additional challenges as a family and it’s been a time of standstill, scrambling, waiting, confusion, seeking to know what our next steps should be and disappointment. It’s felt as if our GC (General Contractor – i.e. God) has just walked off the job and left us to try to figure things out on our own.

Personally, I NEED to finish things that I’ve started. I like the sense of completion and accomplishment when I’ve wrapped up a project that I’m working on. Being honest, I find a sense of worth in those completed projects. I feel good about myself. All is right with my world. It’s in control. (Read MY control.) When things are left in process, it makes me feel really unsettled, aggravated and as if everything is out of control, especially when I don’t know what the next steps should be or I’m waiting on others to take steps that are necessary in order for me move forward. We put in call after call to our GC and He doesn’t seem to pick up His phone or respond to the MANY messages we leave, although we KNOW He hears them. It leaves us feeling lost, frightened, angry, frustrated and wondering when we can get moving forward again. Yet even then, we have an unshakeable trust in Him, knowing that He has a plan, His timing is always perfect and that He finishes what He starts (Phil. 1:6).

Those times of delay are often the times when we learn the most. I read a definition in my Bible this morning for the words “shall live.” It means, “to live, to stay alive, be preserved; to flourish, to enjoy life; to live in happiness; to breathe, be alive, be animated, recover health, live continuously. The fundamental idea is to, ‘live and breathe,’ breathing being the evidence of life in the Hebrew concept.” These last two months have had an absence of flourishing, enjoyment, happiness, animation and constant living and breathing in the moment. I was reminded this week to look for and anticipate the moments that would take my breath away, the moments of living fully in the moment we’re currently in, of being fully present, not distracted by the things that are or are not going on, being fully alive through it all, not shut down and missing out on the breathtaking moments all around me. 

A friend had a recent conversation with Bri about living in the “pauses” of life. That’s sat with me daily ever since. For someone with my personality, pauses are HARD. I want to be DOING, ACCOMPLISHING, COMPLETING….M-O-V-I-N-G FORWARD. I’m learning to embrace the pause. LIVE in the pause. Trust HIM in the pause. It’s hard. I’m not going to lie about that. BUT….it’s beautiful too. I can’t claim to understand the many mysteries of God and I won’t even try. What I do know beyond a shadow of a doubt is that He loves us. He cares for us. He treasures us. He protects and defends us. EVEN WHEN IT DOESN’T FEEL LIKE IT.

This scripture sat with me this morning as I spent time with Him. It’s from Habakkuk 3:17-19. They’re favorite verses of mine that I hadn’t read in a long time. I love God’s timing.

“Though the fig tree may not blossom,

Nor fruit be on the vines;

Though the labor of the olive may fail,

And the fields yield no food;

Though the flock may be cut off from the fold,

And there be no herd in the stalls –

Yet I will rejoice in the Lord,

I will joy in the God of my salvation.

The Lord God is my strength;

He will make my feet like deer’s feet,

And He will make me walk on my high hills.”

We will not stop dreaming and planning. We will not stop putting our faith in the One who sees far more than we ever will. He has a “bird’s eye perspective” over the building process and we trust in Him and what we cannot see. That silence that has seemed so resounding? He hasn’t been silent at all. He’s simply been speaking in unexpected ways that we weren’t immediately attributing to Him. He’s been answering our voicemails through others, as GC’s often do. We’re living in the delay and allowing the adjusted plans to unfold on a daily basis. It’s hard, but it’s good.

(Definition of “shall live” taken from the “Word Wealth” for Habakkuk 2:4, the Spirit Filled Life Bible, NKJV, published by Nelson.)