Have you ever had a dream or aspiration that you KNOW is going to be made a reality someday. Throughout my life I have had this happen to me several times. I remember an instance when I was 12, I would watch and listen to my cousin play the drums. He had been playing since he was 6 and at the time he was 15; in other words, he was GOOD! As I listened to how consistent and creative he was, I desired to have that same ability. Well, we didn’t have a drum set and the only one that was accessible was the one at church, but I wasn’t about to make a fool of myself attempting to learn the drums. Ha, I laugh about it now, but this is exactly what happened. A few years later my dad was the music minister and my cousin played drums for him. As time went on my cousin could no longer fulfill the role of drummer. Yep, you guessed it, that’s where I came in. To this point I had maybe, MAYBE played the drums a total of 5 times. I somewhat had the standard beat down but that was a stretch. My dad came to me an hour before church saying, “Nay, I need you.” Powerful words coming from your dad. At first I wanted to back down, say “no way!” and let him go on without a drummer. After about 2 minutes I caved and said ok. He taught me the basic beat and said, “slow this down and speed this up according to the song.” Well I’ll save that story for another day, but here I am 7 years later and I play the drums for several groups! I owe all of this to God and my dad. Without my dad asking for my help, I’m not sure if I ever would have ever picked up the drums, and without God, well, it simple: I’m nothing.
Now with all that, the dream that I had to play the drums was something that took 3 years before I ever saw the start, and that was just the start! Although God placed the desire in me to play, that dream wasn’t for 12 year old Nathan. That dream was meant for the 15 year old Nathan. As I look at the Bible I quickly realize, I’m not the only one this happens too. Abraham was promised a son and didn’t see that come to pass until it was the most inopportune time (and that’s a whole other post in itself)! Joseph was promised that his family would look to him and that they would bow to him. That didn’t happen until his brothers beat him up, sold him into slavery and never saw him for several years after, long enough to not even recognized him. David was anointed to be King of Israel. Ha, he was in constant danger of death, consistently ran from Saul and then had to deal with Ish-Boseth (Saul’s descendant) before he ever saw the opportunity to be king. Job never knew it, but he was to be more blessed that he was. Before he got that blessing, he lost everything! Peter was to be the Rock of the church, before that happened he denied Christ 3 times in a matter of moments. Little did he know that days later 3,000 people would be saved because of a message that he spoke. And Jesus…he is the King of the World, but he came humbly and died for humanity, suffered greater than any human in history, and yet never once exercised the dominion that he has over us as humans. That is a perfect example of patience, which is the message I am conveying here.

1 Timothy 1:16 “But I received mercy for this reason, that in me, as the foremost, Jesus Christ might display his perfect patience as an example to those who were to believe in him for eternal life.”