THURSDAY - Devotional

READ: Psalm 22:8-11

(Answer the question/s below in your app notes)

• Why does God sometimes seem to take so long when we really need him?

I’ll never forget that miserable day when my car broke down on the side of the road, my eyes immediately watering up, defeated and depleted from working outside in the Californian summertime.

I worked on a small orange orchard outside of the city, and that day had been particularly sweaty and long. The drive home always was picturesque, but that day had been so exhausting that I could barely register the beautiful painting of a sunset in my rearview mirror. Suddenly, I heard and felt the tire all at once: POP!

Luckily for me, I had roadside assistance with AAA car insurance. After all, I paid faithfully each month for situations like this, right? I called up the number my dad had programmed into my contacts when I was 16 and first learning how to drive. “Call if you ever break down,” he instructed. Now, all these years later, I was taking him up on his advice.

“Sit tight, we’ll get a tow truck out there in the next hour for ya,” the gruff voice on the other end of the line said.

“An HOUR?!” I squeaked. All I wanted to do was collapse on my bed at home and fall asleep from this miserable day.

“Maybe more. Maybe less. Hard to tell.” His apathy was suffocating.

God’s timeline can feel frustrating to us, especially in situations where we’d prefer immediate relief. Sometimes, we will have the luxury of looking back and seeing the intelligence in God’s plan. Sometimes, we may not get an answer to why God’s pace doesn’t correlate with ours. Trust is hard. Patience is hard. It’s okay to have a hard time with God’s timeline.