“For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.” Jeremiah 29:11
This is one of my favorite scriptures. I love the thought of an expected end. To know that God’s thoughts toward me are good, always made me feel blessed. But, it wasn’t until I went through a hard trial in my life that God showed me this scripture in a different light.
During this trial I began to question God because it didn’t seem like the path He was taking me down was going to lead me to what I had been praying for. As a matter of fact, it seemed like I was going the opposite direction of where I wanted to be. Have you ever been there? You may have prayed for more money then you get fired from your job. You may have prayed that your children come back to God and it seems like they have ventured further into sin. You may have prayed for God to heal your body, but the test results are still the same. Let me encourage you with the words that God spoke to me: The middle doesn’t matter!
If we take a closer look at Jeremiah 29:11 it says “to give you an expected end.” Did you catch that? God promised an expected end. God didn’t promise that the middle of our situation would be what we were expecting. You may be in the middle of a situation right now that you were not expecting. You weren’t expecting to lose your job. You weren’t expecting to be rejected. You weren’t expecting to get that eviction notice. You weren’t expecting to be declined. You weren’t expecting to be put to shame and embarrassed. You weren’t expecting your spouse to walk out on you. You weren’t expecting to get sick, but here you are, right in an unexpected middle that may have caught you off guard and may have even set you back a few steps. Can I remind you that your situation has not caught God off guard? He promised you an expected end. The bible says better is the end of a thing than the beginning (Ecclesiastes 7:8). So keep your focus on God and what he promised and the middle won’t even matter.
You see, God sees the bigger picture. He sees things that you and I can’t see from where we are. The road that you and I expected to travel down may have gotten us to our goals a lot quicker and I’m sure it certainly would’ve been a lot easier, but it may not have led to the end that we were really expecting. We may plan our lives, but God directs our paths and God always has better. (Proverbs 16:9)
So, instead of pouting and getting angry with God for taking you through an unexpected middle, ask him to show you himself during this time. Ask Him to help you to see Him at work during this time. Get in His word, pray and seek His face and allow Him to mold you into the person he wants you to be. And when you finally get through your unexpected middle and get to your expected end, you’ll look back and see that the road God sent you down was the best way after all; because you will not only have victory, but you will have a deeper prayer life, you will know how to trust him more, you will know what it really means to lean and depend on God, you will have a deeper level of faith, and you will be closer to God than you’ve ever been before and that’s what it’s really all about.
