EXPECTANT

What comes to mind when you read that word expectant? Waiting for medical tests? Waiting for a college acceptance letter? Submitting resumes as you look for a new job? The new season of your favorite TV show that left you with a cliffhanger in last year's season finale? Or maybe waiting for your first child to make his or her entry into the world?

But how often do we connect expectancy with God? It certainly wasn't my first connection until recently. This past February I started feeling fatigued. This wasn't necessarily unusual. With some of my cancer treatments I've been tired. I'd spend a few hours a day resting but then up and going the rest of the day. In May I had a benign mass removed from my right jaw. I was in bed all day. That's expected after a surgery for the first few days or week. What I didn't expect was that all-day fatigue stretching into weeks and then months.

I am a doer and laying in bed was definitely NOT doing. I was reading and working on some writing, but it was minimal and didn't feel like much when I had three quilts waiting to be made among other things. One of the books I read was Suffering: Gospel Hope When Life Doesn't Make Sense by Paul David Tripp. Even though, I've studied quite a bit on the topic of suffering to grow as a Biblical counselor as well as in my own health struggles, but there was one quote in particular that jumped out at me.

“Because of the amazing practical wisdom of God’s Word, the glory of God’s presence and power, and the reality of mercies that are new every morning, we do not have to run from this topic [suffering]. We can stare it in the face with open and expectant hearts."

I have seen God do amazing things through my rounds of cancer, but I'm forgetful. One of my favorite verses in Psalms is 27:14, "Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the Lord." The psalmist was expectant of what God would do even with his enemies surrounding him. But when my fatigue hit, all I could see was the wasted time in bed, my circumstances. I forgot to be expectant. Perspective changes everything. Who or what we focus on shapes how we view our circumstances.

After reading that quote, I shifted my thinking from my circumstances to God and who He is specifically that He is always purposeful. I began looking at my time in bed through that lens: God's good purposes for me. I started waking up each day with expectancy of how God would use my time in bed for His glory, to love others and to conform me more to the image of Jesus.

Do you know what happened? God's blessings were abundantly evident throughout this time of fatigue. I realized I was spending even more time in prayer for others. I had time to check-in with people to catch up and see how I could pray specifically for them. I had focused time to work on getting everything ready for my next book coming out including this website.

One of the most exciting blessings was the idea God gave me for writing ways to pray for people struggling in specific areas like depression, grief or anxiety. With expectancy I used what I have learned as a Biblical counselor to write prayers that might help others pray more specifically and with expectancy. I had finished the first set of prayers for depression when God did what He so often does ~ He did more than I expected, asked or thought (Ephesians 3:20).

I was messaging with a friend in Honduras. She and her husband train church leaders and are developing teaching materials online to equip believers. I shared with her the prayers I was working on. She got excited. She asked if they could be translated into Spanish for them and others in Honduras (or anywhere) to be used. From there the prayers have already been translated and put into a single pdf "book" complete with cover and pictures that can be downloaded. Her enthusiasm for the project encouraged me. The English version will be available soon under the "Free Resources" tab here and updated as I add more prayers.

EXPECTANT. I pray that by God's grace I can continue facing each day expectant for what God will do no matter what the circumstances. "I wait for the LORD, my soul waits, and in His word I hope;" Psalm 130:5