Expectant. That is the word that God put on my heart as 2018 began. It was the word that I prayed over our little tribe as the value I wanted to embody our lives. Not only were we quite literally expecting our sweet Gideon to make his debut in a few short months, but we also were expecting so much more in terms of our ministry and the fulfillment of our dreams. I wanted to wake up each day expectant for what God would do, and how He would use us in His great work.
That sense of expectancy and hope faded quickly as we found ourselves having to leave the mission field with a sick baby boy and shattered dreams. It is safe to say, that 2018 has not been what we expected in any way. I am not sitting in the country that I expected to be sitting in, not living in the house I expected to be living in, and definitely not doing the things that I expected to be doing. Everything that we expected this year to be is gone, and I had long since forgotten about my focus on being expectant at the beginning of the year.
It wasn’t until today that I remembered that intent to be more expectant in 2018. As God reminded me of those beginning of the year prayers, I kind of laughed at the fact that nothing at all had turned out the way we had expected. Then I just dared to ask, “God, why give me such an ironic word to pray over our family this year? Why ask me to be expectant when we would face so much unexpected change and pain?”
“Because in the darkness of the night I would ask you and your little tribe to expect me to move again. I would ask you to dare to hope again. To begin to dream again. I would call you to trust and expect me to use you again. I knew how hard it would be for you to be expectant again, but I am asking you to do just that.”
If I am honest, I stopped being expectant months ago. I stopped dreaming on June 17th when I looked down on Guatemalan soil from an airplane, not knowing that it was goodbye to the calling our family had long pursued. I stopped hoping when doctors told us our sweet baby boy could not live at the high altitude of the place we called home. But here He is calling me back in. Asking me to open my heart with a spirit of expectancy once again.
He is drawing my heart to Isaiah 43:18-19 where His Word says, “Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.”
It seems like a lifetime since I say in our little living room in Guatemala declaring 2018 the year of expectancy for our family, but here we are we just a few months of the year remaining. And little by little, my heart is willing to trust again. Willing to be expectant one more time, following the God who makes all things new. As He continues to write our story, our will trust and journey with the One True King of the universe. We are daring to hope again. We are daring to be expectant.
Could it be that He is calling you to the same? Asking you to expect Him to work in big ways in your life? Is it possible that He is asking to dare to hope again? Maybe you too have lost hope, friend, but I encourage you to open your heart and dare to be expectant once again.
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