Your Winding Plotline

Your Winding Plotline

David was thirty years old when he began to reign. 2 Samuel 5:4

DAVID WAS “ONLY A BOY” when Samuel anointed him as the next king (1 Samuel 16:11-12; 17:33), yet he didn’t rule over all of Israel until he was thirty. In the years between, he was exiled by an emotionally volatile king, nearly killed on several occasions, forced to hide out in caves, rejected by his own men, and then at the center of civil wars after the reigning king had died. At numerous points along the way, God’s plan for David looked impossible, as if Samuel had made a huge mistake in discerning God’s voice all those years before. Yet David was one of many who had been given a promise or a vision only to endure long, winding, painful paths toward fulfillment. His story was neither a straight nor short plotline.

No good plotline is. Fiction writers are often taught to put their protagonist in an impossible situation and then, when things are almost unbearable, make it worse. Why? Because no one reads a novel or watches a movie for a modest victory over a few minor obstacles. Great victories come from great challenges. God is not writing fiction, of course, but he does have a flair for the dramatic. He is unveiling his nature, demonstrating his most stunning attributes over the course of history to a world that has forgotten who he is. You have both the privilege and the trauma of being one of his protagonists. The journey into your destiny is a winding road marked with extreme dangers. Your life of prayer and faith is not a cruise to the beach. It’s going to involve some demanding turns and climbs.

Along the way, you will be asked to maintain faith and pray with conviction. You don’t have to figure things out, but you do have to cling to trust. Even more, you will weather your journey well if you keep your eyes on the visions or promises God has given you and insist that they remain true. Faith rejoices over an answer even when it looks impossible. Like David and many before and since, you are moving toward a glorious resolution. Believe, and your time of fulfillment will come.

The Lord gets his best soldiers out of the highlands of affliction.