Cocoon Time
Theme of the Week: Wasted Time?
Stephen W. Smith
Monday, October 8, 2007
 1 of 1
Key Bible Verse: But those who wait on the Lord will find new strength. They will fly high on wings like eagles Isaiah 40:31). Bonus Reading: Psalm 62:5-8
We don't like waiting. The microwave doesn't work fast enough; the internet connection is too slow. But something transformational happens when a person learns to wait. The caterpillar spinning its cocoon is not preparing a place of escape but a place to wait for transformation, a sanctuary for change. The time of waiting is actually a season of becoming. In the dark, the caterpillar waits for the moment of rebirth.
Transformation doesn't come if we move too quickly. We need to make space for God. When we wait and are still, He comes near. The place of waiting can provide asylum, not to hide but to hear God. Jonah heard God only in the cocoon of a fish's belly.
Moses waited in a cocoon of wilderness for 40 years. Paul lingered in Arabia for three years after his dramatic encounter with Jesus. Jesus remained in the tomb for three days. Something happens in the cocoon that can happen nowhere else. Change happens. Transformation begins.
Waiting sets aside the unimportant and allows the one waiting to be seized by the eternally significant. Through waiting, we find that our wings are more than wings of butterflies. We are taught to soar on wings like eagles.
—Stephen W. Smith in Embracing Soul Care
My Response: To adjust to the rhythm of waiting, I will need to …
Adapted from Embracing Soul Care (Kregel, 2006) by permission.
Copyright © 2007 by the author or Christianity Today International/Men of Integrity magazine. Click here for reprint information on Men of Integrity. 1 of 1
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Teach me, Lord, to leash in my drive to make things happen and wait expectantly for Your move.
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