Often, we get frustrated because of how long it’s taking our story to unfold. Or maybe, we secretly think how insignificant our story seems compared to other people’s stories. When I wait in transient seasons, wondering what’s next and if I’m even leaving a scratch on the etchings of this world’s story, I get caught wondering the same things. I question my callings sometimes. It feels like wheels are spinning and I’m not even moving a millimeter at times. I bet you’ve felt that way, too.
I asked my husband what he’s been studying in the Bible recently. He said he had been reading in John and kind of wondering why Jesus didn’t start his official ministry until around age 30.
Then it hit me like a lightening bolt. John the Baptist. His story had to be lived before the Greatest Story ever told could be read in living letters. John had to grow into his calling so the prophecies about the voice crying in the wilderness, preparing the way for the Messiah could be fulfilled. It took time, around thirty years or so. Jesus valued John’s calling and waited until God the Father matured John into it.
All the stories of all time intersected on this highway John was making for the Lord of the Universe to ride in on. All those stories matter. The callings of each story are valuable. Some people have responded with obedience to the voice of God. Others have run away and missed the best story because of disobedience. The Greatest Story ever told started before John the Baptist’s did, but Jesus came on the page at exactly the right time to offer the best meaning and value to every story that preceded and followed
“ The next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, “Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world! This is the one I meant when I said, ‘A man who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.’ I myself did not know him, but the reason I came baptizing with water was that he might be revealed to Israel.” John 1:29-31
No one ever knows how his or her story will turn out. People just kept responding to the voice that called them to live the pages given to them. (Or sometimes people ignore that voice and find what they think make for better pages.) Without chapters of conflicts, joys, and adventures, there would have been no need for resolution.
Each story ties to another calling. God times growing into a calling according to His perfect calendar. He desires for each story to bump into His greatest call to follow Him first and then to prepare the way for other stories to be woven into His story. He knows which stories need to appear in which order. Every one of them matters.
Your calling is tied to someone else’s calling. How you respond to your own calling impacts other people’s callings. You may feel like it’s taking forever to see your work fleshed out. But the truth is, as you yield to God’s direction, He is timing it all perfectly because your story is connected with someone else’s story.
Your calling serves as a highway for God’s calling in someone else’s life. Your story has meaning, no matter how mundane your hours may seem. Your pages’ words have value, no matter how much or how little money you make.
When you feel discouraged or stuck, don’t give up.
Your waiting might just be when God is working the most to prepare the optimum moment to connect the lines of what you’ve been made for with someone else’s maiden calling.
Your story was made to fit right into the volumes that fill God’s story. The ink of your days is filled with purpose. Some days may be less noteworthy than others, but even the blah days are important, because they help highlight the extraordinary days. Ordinary and not so ordinary days are packed with story because each one is different, no matter how repetitive they may seem.
You may be scratching your head daily, trying to figure out how to do the thing that God has called you to do. Or, you may be pressing your ear to the clouds, waiting for the call in the first place.
But as you wait in what may seem to be a cycle of repeat, sounds are new, skies vary in color, the wind blows plants in different directions, and shadows fall in varying spots. There is a maturing happening in you with every box on the calendar as you live out the next sentence you’ve agreed to let God write through your life.
Even while you wait for the big things spoken over your life before you were born to happen, your days matter. Your little is much when the hands of your maker cultivate it. Your big is bigger when you’ve trusted it to God. Your story matters.
Someone else’s story may be about to bump into your own, to create a highway for your own story to be inked and to bump into another story, waiting to have fresh pages penned.
Just keep listening. And keep responding in obedience to what the hand of God desires to write with your life’s story. And don’t doubt for a minute that your pages are insignificant.
Whether you’re a gospel singer or a grocery bagger, whether you’re a homemaker or a homeless person, whether you’re a preacher or a politician, whether you’re a writer or a waiter, whether you’re a teacher or a tractor driver, whether you’re a screenwriter or a screen watcher… your story matters.
Live your story with confidence as you respond with obedience.
Be patient. Breathe. Trust God’s timing.
Let your story prepare the way for someone else’s story.