1599 Not What I Asked For

Have you ever asked God for one thing and you feel like you get something totally different? Have you started to question Jesus’ word where he says “ask and ye shall receive”? Yeah Lord, I’ve been asking but what I’ve been receiving has been disappointing in comparison to what I was expecting.

The Israelites were hungry in the desert and they asked God to supply their needs and give them food to eat. The next day they woke up to manna. We know manna as this miraculous bread directly from God which sustained the Israelites where there was nothing else to eat. But let me tell you, THIS WAS NOT WHAT THEY WERE EXPECTING.

Exodus 16: 13-15 “In the morning there was a layer of dew around the camp. When the dew was gone, thin flakes like frost on the ground appeared on the desert floor. When the Israelites saw it, they said to each other, “What is it?” For they did not know what it was. Moses said to them, “It is the bread the Lord has given you to eat.”

I propose they woke up that morning and saw this white dewy, sticky substance all over the desert ground and they really said “What the heck is THIS?” I don’t know, maybe they were expecting Sarah Lee herself to appear at sunrise baking her fresh loaves of bread, but this … this is not what they were expecting. What is this and what am I supposed to do with it?

And this is why they called it manna. Manna to them meant “what is it?” It meant “now what do we do”?

Maybe you’ve been asking God for guidance and there hasn’t been a single flashing sign making the way clear yet. You’re just as confused as you ever were as doors continue to close and you wander along. But my sister, don’t miss the fact that closed doors are guidance. That no you received was in response to your request for guidance. Sure it’s disappointing, but you simply don’t know what God was protecting you from when he shut that down. Nor do you know the open door with something better than you ever imagined still awaiting you. The only way God guides you to it is to disappoint you by closing those other doors you were so willing to settle with.

Yes, this is what guidance looks like. It doesn’t feel miraculous, but it is. You just don’t recognize it for what it really is.

The Israelites didn’t recognize the white dew covering the ground for what it was either. It didn’t look miraculous. It didn’t look like loaves of bread, but they didn’t yet know what God had given them. There’s more coming here.

We all know better than to pray for patience, right? What happens when you pray for patience? You’re given complete chaos with an invitation to calm the heck down in the middle of it.

Patience isn’t developed in the calm, honey. Patience is developed in those moments where you have to bite your tongue so hard it bleeds. Patience is developed when you’re stuck waiting and every ounce of you wants to lash out, respond, fight back, and push forward.

Oh, that’s where you woke up? You woke up in the training grounds for patience today? You may not like this, but God sure likes what he’s developing in you here. He sure likes the lessons you will learn in this. He sure likes how much more you’re becoming like the girl he created you to be through this training.

So, he’s not going to get you out of it. He’s going to provide in miraculous and mysterious ways right in the middle of it … and you may not recognize it for what it really is.

Marriage doesn’t look the way you thought it would, does it?