Embracing the Small Steps

In Genesis 12, God calls Abram to leave his country, family, and everything he has ever known to go to a new land. God leads him into Canaan and tells him that he would give that land to him and his descendants (v7). Then something interesting happens. A famine strikes Canaan and Abram and his family have to go to Egypt to survive. *insert puzzled look emoji here*

Something doesn’t seem to compute about those steps. God calls Abram into Canaan, promises him that land, and then a famine hits and he has to leave that land. As I was reading through those verses the other day, God spoke to me about them. This year, one of the things God has been laying on my heart is to embrace the small steps. God showed Abram the land he would inherit, but that didn’t mean it was going to happen immediately.

So often when I think about the vision God has for my life, I can see point A and point B, but I don’t know how to connect the dots. It can be frustrating, discouraging, and annoying. I often find myself saying to God, “I know that is where you have called me but I don’t know how to get there.” The problem is that I want to be there immediately. When I can’t figure out how to get there immediately, I end up just sitting there and going nowhere.

If you continue reading Genesis, you see that Abram eventually does settle in Canaan. But at that point, he still doesn’t have any descendants. In fact, Abram doesn’t have Issac until he is 100 years old. He left his family and country when he was 75. 25 years passed before one of the most crucial steps of Abram’s descendants inheriting the land happened. It was 25 years before Abram had the son that God had promised him would inherit this land.

God has great plans for each of us, but we won’t immediately arrive at our destinations. Even when we don’t know how to get to that final place, we have to take small steps. This year, rather than set these big lofty resolutions, I have decided to take one step at a time. Each month I’ll have a small goal that will move me towards the things God has called me to. I can’t do it all at once, so I’m not going to try to.

until next time…