We pray, cry and beg God on behalf of our children, our marriages, our friends, or neighbors. Where is He in the midst of this crazy, chaotic, torn -up world? We fight, strain and complain our way through the day seeking God to do the impossible but seeing nothing change in the day to day.
Just as a mama sees tiny changes on the face of her child over the days and weeks of his first year, yet looking back over the old, worn photos years later, the changes are starke and obvious, this is the way our God has chosen to move most often in our lives.
We want the fast, the now, the big. God wants the heart, the healing, the walk.
Genesis 11:10-26 displays the line from Seth to Abram like a ribbon through time. The men after Seth each fathered a named son within 29-35 years of their life. Everyone mentioned is also noted to have "had other sons and daughters" as well. Seemingly large families that started at a relatively young age compared to preflood and even to their patriarch, Seth, who fathered his first son at 100 years old.
Then there is Terah. Born to his own father at a young 29 years, the youngest father of this line thus far.
I imagine Terah grows into a man, seeks a wife and attempts to begin his own family, like all those before him. Maybe he was 35 or 40 the first time he wondered why his bride had not concieved. Maybe by the time he was 50 he was wondering if his line would even continue. Another 20 years pass before his wife's middle would round out with child and a son would be born to this couple. Abram, a son. And then two other sons. But Scripture does not tell that Terah, like his grandfathers, would have other sons and daughters. Nope, just three. And at the ripe old age of 70.
Later we learn that Terah was not seeking the Lord, as Joshua tells is in Joshua 24:2. Terah lived beyond the Euphrates River and worshiped other gods. Yet I find his story compelling. All too often, I find myself waiting longer than I want to for more than I think I get. Like Terah, at times I feel like I am waiting twice as long for half as much yet I begging God for the now and the more.
God is most often working through the wait and the few.
Terah fathered only three sons, one of which became the first patriach in the line of God's chosen people who would be used by God in a most profound way.
What if the seemingly extra long wait... waiting for our marriage to heal, our child to turn to the Lord, our dream to be reality, our illness to heal... what if in that wait and in that few is the walking with God that brings about the healing, the trust, the usefulness for His kingdom that He has stored up for us all along.
