ALWAYS DO

My friends and I had a Bible study recently, and we talked about being stuck in the middle, being stuck in suffering or a season of waiting, between the “death and the resurrection.”

We all felt like that’s where we’re at in life. We felt like that even before COVID-19, but we especially feel like that now with COVID-19. We talked about why we’d be in this season, what we should do in this season, and what God might be wanting to work through us. This conversation was based on a sermon most of us had watched, but it was also something I had been contemplating for months. What can I do in my waiting season, when I am suffering, when I’m continuously asking for relief and waiting for answers? The conclusion my friends and I came to was that we should let the purpose of the journey toward deliverance shine through us, appreciate the process, and praise God.

You led me through the depths as through the wilderness

Your faithful hands have turned my doubt to wonder

You keep me in Your rest, head and heart on Your chest

Your presence will abide with me forever 

I’m sure some of y’all are feeling something similar.

This COVID-19 has halted jobs and social gatherings, has compromised both physical and mental health, has disrupted our daily schedules and potentially our life plans. It has caused us to be stuck in a season we have no control over with only the hope of relief and something greater, once COVID-19 has died down, to push us through. I’m sure some of y’all have been feeling something similar for months, before COVID-19, like I have, whether waiting on a breakthrough in your career, a mending in your relationships, or a release of God’s healing power that has pulled you into a journey that you didn’t realize would take this long.

For years I lived alone afraid of being known

The failures of my past holding me hostage

But You were ever close, surrounding me in love

Your kindness wore down all of my defenses, oh

Maybe we’re on this journey to grow up and mature, to perfect our craft, or to plan our futures based on what God has for us instead of what we wanted.

Maybe we’re on this journey to learn how to be selfless and serve others, to appreciate the loved ones we have, to actually face pain head on so that we can properly heal and work through it.

Maybe we’re on this journey to find our purpose or to find ourselves.

Whatever the reason, we can trust that God is working in us and through us for a reason. We just have to keep going back to God, surrendering ourselves and all that we know, and come out on the other side transformed as a result of walking through the journey with a serving heart and purpose-driven focus instead of complaining through it like the Israelites did in the wilderness. 

I'm gonna dance here out in the desert

Though my enemies are closing in

Hope isn't lost or wearing thin

I know You are gonna come through, You always do

This idea of appreciating the journey and trusting God in it without losing hope is why I resonated so much with the lyrics to this song, “Always Do” by Heath Williams and 10,000 Fathers. I introduced it this past Sunday because of its declaration of hope and trust in God.

When listening to the song, I think about the promises I’m waiting for, the suffering and pain I’ve been through in the waiting, and the uncertainty of this COVID-19 pandemic and release them to God, opening room in my mind for memories of His goodness as I choose to dance, as I choose to praise, as I choose to hope, as I choose to trust that, because He’s faithful and has brought me through times before, He will do it again. 

I’m gonna shout here out in the desert

For in every single circumstance

Your promise is deliverance

I know You are gonna come through, You always do

He always does.

- Coty Miller, Worship Director