By Elise Adams

Sometimes I feel like a little kid desperate to know how many more days until Christmas—and exactly what’s inside each of her presents. But no one will tell me! I cry, beg, plead… yet no matter how I wrestle with the All-Knowing Being, He won’t say. I will never know. I just have to wait.

The Law of Gestation says that every seed has an incubation period required for its full development. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we knew the gestation time for all our dreams and ideas? Imagine walking into a “life store” and seeing every desire of your heart lined up on the shelves, each with a little tag showing how many days, weeks, or years it would take to come true. We could “shop” for the dreams that fit perfectly into our life plans—save our pennies, and choose only the ones that timed out just right. Ah… how fun would that be?

But that’s not how it works. Nope.

“Oh, but Elise,” you might say, “we do know some gestation periods—40 weeks for a baby, a certain number of days for seeds to sprout so we can feed our families. We know the timelines for plenty of things!” And I’d say… yes, you’re absolutely right. God has blessed us with so much light and knowledge, and He’s enlightened countless scientific minds so we can understand this world we live in.

But here’s the thing: God knows us well enough to understand that giving us all the information isn’t always best. If we knew exactly how long it would take to reach our dreams, would we still go after them? If we could see all the heartache and frustration that “not knowing” might bring, would we even try? Be honest—if you really knew the gestation period of your deepest desires, would you even get out of bed? I wouldn’t. That kind of knowledge could be overwhelming—maybe even paralyzing.

Every idea seed has its own incubation period. How long must we wait? We don’t know. And that’s the point. Each dream varies—not just from person to person, but even within one person’s life. One dream may bloom quickly; another might take years. For some, that uncertainty is comforting—it means our dreams are simply growing in their own time. For others, it’s maddening, like a child who keeps asking, “How much longer?”

Leslie Householder, in Hidden Treasures: Heaven’s Astonishing Help with Your Money Matters, reminds us that while we can’t control the timeline, there are two things we can control to help the process along:

“We can increase the intensity of our seeking.”
“We can improve the quality of our faith through study, practice, and obedience.”

In other words, we do have some say in the matter. We can seek with more intensity. We can strengthen our faith. Both take work, time, and sacrifice. But after we’ve done all we can do—all we can do—we must let go and let God.

Worry and stress will not, I repeat, will not speed things up. Our job is to do the work, release the fear, and fill our minds with the sweet assurance that God knows, God loves us, and all will be well with Him at the helm.

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