This may be the most quintessential post of my life, at least at this point. I am clanking on keys not sure where this is going. This has felt like the last 6 weeks of life.
As we stepped away from one thing into the unknown there was a certainty that the Lord would make clear the next step. With a heavy heart and a handful of hope, we resigned our church believing God’s best was just ahead.
Enter heartbreak.
Without much detail, the door that looked promising and the answer to our prayers quickly closed in our faces with no explanation, no conversation. It stung. It was painful. It felt personal without any personal contact.
Which leaves us here feeling a little like David. Called. Anointed. And stuck in the in-between. Knowing what the Lord has said and seeing no real way to get where he has said to go.
So we have asked ourselves the question I believe David had to ask. What do we do in the meantime?
Now, I can say with certainty, I am not raising up a small army. And no one is trying to kill me. So we can exclude those pieces of the narrative. But my heart deeply connects with the psalms of the man in between. My hearts bangs and beats with rhythms of the songs David wrote from caves and plains and hills where the oil of anointing lingered in his nostrils, but the opportunity of the position was still a far way off.
The in-between. Not heaven. Not hell. Just hard. Moments of God’s miraculous provision juxtaposed with moments of lengthy silence from the Lord. With prayers and praise pronounced in volume to be met with stillness and silence in the hopes of hearing about a next step.
Every year we watched the classic film White Christmas. The ole’ General who is now running the inn is at an impasse as the lack of snow has created a lack of business. So in his mind it is time to re-enlist, go back to the field. As he waits for the letter and anticipated assignment, some old Army buddies have arrived. Enter a one-liner I use to this day – “I am playing a little trombone myself” as Bing Crosby reads the letter from the US Army.
The hard part of the in-between is the stealthy thought that I should just go back. Go back to the Army, go back to Egypt, go back to my father’s fields, go back to the church we left. The arduous in-between stacked with silence of the next will slide into our consciousness of a return to what was previous. But we all really know, there is no going back. There is only going forward.
God’s gear box for our life does not have reverse.
Waiting on the next is a one-way road. It only goes forward. Like David on the run until the appointed time of his kingship, we will keep moving.
While uncertain if this psalm was penned in those days of in-between for the future king, it certainly feels like it. And maybe it just feels like the prayer I am trying to pray currently:
Hear me, Lord, and answer me,
for I am poor and needy.
Guard my life, for I am faithful to you;
save your servant who trusts in you.
You are my God; have mercy on me, Lord,
for I call to you all day long.
Bring joy to your servant, Lord,
for I put my trust in you.
