Keep Your Toes In
We’ve made a habit the last couple of years of recording the Scriptures and pictures God brings to our prayer team. I have a box full of cards from the Sunday prayer team. And we have a journal in the living room filling with things we believe God has spoken when we’ve prayed together. One of those has been firmly in my imagination for two months now.
During our prayer week before school started, God gave Christine a picture. It was of toes dipped in the water. She felt an invitation to hold there – that the longer the foot was in the cold water, the more comfortable it became. When she shared it with the group, collectively we went to Joshua 3 where the leaders of the Israelites put their toes in the water. I have a little note next to it wondering - is this a word about hesitancy?
Two months ago it was just a connection: a picture given to Christine and a passage of Scripture where that happens. As I’ve held that now, I see more connection to a previous night of prayer’s theme, “waiting on the LORD.”
Many of the prayer requests among the community of Kitsap House lately have been about what we’re waiting for:
Waiting for pay checks to be released
Waiting for long term illness to find its end - begging for healing
Waiting for career clarity
Waiting for roommates and partners
Waiting for restoration of joy
This Sunday we’ll be reaching that passage during our series, Less is More. And I’m sending out this blog because I think this particular passage may be one where God could meet all of us who have been waiting.
Joshua had less options, not more, for a dangerous crossing. And with that one option, there was no promise of immediacy. Just come on in, dip your toes in, and stand there. Then see what God has in store.
I can’t issue you any promise that after Sunday you might have immediate clarity about what you’re waiting for, but I want to invite you to hear God’s Word, his timeless story about who he is and how he operates. Let God seed in your mind with this story what he has seeded in mine: a hope that God is at work upstream. That if I stay here, steady in the uncertainty, that it’ll get more comfortable to stay here and wait on the LORD.
We are emphasizing this month in our Common Rule the practice of having a Pattern Group. I encourage you to share with them (or if you’re not in one to have an intentional conversation with a close friend) – what is it you’re waiting for? Let them stand with you and hold with you the hope that God is at work upstream. When you meet, you could read this story together and ask God’s Spirit to give you confidence as you wait for God.
- Pastor Megan
