{Be Real} Present to the Process

Listening to the birds chirp, astounded by flowers blossoming all around, I revel in its beauty. And I almost forget.

I almost forget how last week I stood, looking out the window across a row of maple trees, scanning it for any signs of spring. I looked away, dejected, asking how could this be? It’s time for spring, creation is ready and we’re all ready. God, seriously? We have to wait longer?

And then, that lone tree looked back at me, and I saw the tender beginning of green spouting from in between its branches.

I almost missed it.

The process had begun.

The process of blossoming and becoming often goes unnoticed. It’s easier to fix our eyes on the “end” result and glorify the future, than to be fully present to the often painful process and the work we are called to here and now.

When keep ourselves fixed on the idea of an “end” to the work, we miss the small brush strokes along the way that are layering the beauty upon our lives.

Even the idea that our hearts grasp onto of an “end” is deceitful.  While we are on earth, when will our heart processes ever end?  Our confidence can rest in this:

“He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ.”

-Philippians 1:6

Did you catch that sister?  This work that God is doing in us, He does in us until Jesus Christ returns.  He will complete it.  But in His timing, the perfect timing when He returns.  And until that day, we have thousands of other days to live, and to work through, while Jesus is living inside us, and helping us in the midst.

It’s hard to glorify the process, because by nature growth is painful. The decision to shoot one burst of green on a barren tree?  The changing, molding, stretching that God asks us to do? It takes daily doses of courage.

And sometimes? We’d rather look away. We’d rather distract ourselves with our schedules or the rest of our lives that appear to be together, than to focus on the part of the process we are called to change.

But God, He sees our growth differently. I think He sings over that little branch, holds it in His hands, until the green begins to appear. And when we look away? He never does. He just waits.

God is eternally patient, and He delights over each moment of our process. And He calls us to be patient while He changes our hearts.

All God has ever cared about, dear one, is your heart.

To Him, it’s never been about getting the job, the forming new relationships, the blogging, the creating art, the starting a business.  These “ends” we seek will never end, and our patience with them will wear thin…until we lay them in His hands.

And wait.  For Him.  To grow something inside of us.  Just like a mother grows a child…God’s Spirit grows within us.

“All around us we observe a pregnant creation.  The difficult times of pain throughout the world are simply birth pangs.  But it’s not only around us; it’s within us.  The Spirit of God is arousing us within.  We’re also feeling the birth pangs.  These sterile and barren bodies of ours are yearning for full deliverance.  That is why waiting does not diminish us, any more than waiting diminishes a pregnant mother.  We are enlarged in the waiting.  We, of course, don’t see what is enlarging us.  But the longer we wait, the larger we become, and the more joyful our expectancy.”

-Romans 8:22-25

We become larger in our waiting – as the Lord grows and stretches our hearts, as He clings to us and draws near.

This has always been the gift.  Jesus, growing us to be more like Him.  And it takes time.

So the rest of the world can wait, and they can just hold their breath expectantly while they look at us. Because God has began something beautiful. He has begun something new, in the seeds of our hearts that are just waiting to burst forth.

As I write, in the distance, a butterfly lands on a blossom.  And I see.  Unless those buds took the time to bloom, the time to develop, that butterfly wouldn’t have a soft place to land and be nourished.

The beauty lies inside of the process. Not outside or after or before. But right in the middle.  Inside the courageous leaps and all the tiny changes.  And God…He is right there singing over each one.  He doesn’t miss a thing in your process, or mine.  It’s all part of His redemption story.

Stay in your process sweet girl.  Love it, and cherish each new seed before it blossoms.  Hold it tender and close, and listen for His song.

Can you hear it?

 

“If we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.”

-Romans 8:25 ESV