When you first receive a word from the Lord, it is tremendously exciting! You want to “shout it from the rooftops” and let the whole world know! But then another desire begins welling up within you—a strong, intense desire to know something: when is this magnificent vision going to come to pass?
That’s when we get into trouble! You might even try to project the specific time for this thing to happen, becoming a kind of prognosticator or fortune-teller without knowing what you are actually doing.
Remember that after Habakkuk 2:2 comes Habakkuk 2:3, which tells us, “For the vision is yet for an appointed time….” This statement usually takes the wind right out of our sails, because we come face to face with the hard reality that this great dream God has given us is not going to happen overnight, nor is it going to happen according to our timing, but God’s timing.
Those of us in the generation of instant gratification—remote control television, jet airplanes, and microwave ovens—usually receive a promise of God with exhilaration, come bursting out of the prayer closet with great expectations and grand plans, then immediately crash into the wall of “an appointed time.”
We have entered into a new dimension of the Christian life called: the patience zone.
The truth of the matter is that most believers, when they receive a word from God, will have to wait, and wait, and wait for it to come to pass—in God’s time. But too often, people make sweeping statements about what they are going to do for God, and when they don’t see it come to pass in the period of time they thought it was going to take, they become very, very discouraged and begin to let go of their vision.
When a believer gets a word from God and decides in his own mind and heart when it will come to pass, he has opened himself for certain disaster. He may even set a date for the manifestation.
Let me warn you: if God doesn’t give you a date or specifically tell you to set a date, then don’t set one! When you set a date yourself and it doesn’t come to pass, it is extremely embarrassing!
Sad to say, many believers have let go of their dream simply because they were embarrassed.
Although we usually groan at the mention of this godly character trait, patience is the key to victory over discouragement and the way to avoid embarrassment.
What does Habakkuk 2:3 say again? “For the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall speak, and not lie: though it tarry, wait for it; because it will surely come, it will not tarry.”
The Word of God is telling us that as we wait, we might think that God has lied to us, and we may be completely worn out, but “wait for it; because it will surely come.”
Excerpt permission granted by Albury Publishing
Rick and Denise met while they were each on an individual quest to wholeheartedly follow God's plan for their lives. Rick was a college student, growing in his teaching ministry. Denise was a talented vocalist. She chose not to pursue a course that held the prospect of performing with the Metropolitan Opera so that she could instead pursue a relationship with Rick and fulfill her heart's desire to enter full-time ministry.
Rick and Denise's friendship has led to lifelong love and a powerful partnership in building the Kingdom of God. After a decade of ministry, first as pastor and then as itinerant ministers, Rick and Denise Renner embarked on an adventure of a lifetime. In January 1991, the Renners and their sons Paul, Philip, and Joel left behind all they knew to relocate their family to serve the region that only weeks earlier had become the former Soviet Union.
Rick and Denise remember kneeling together as a family and kissing the ground when they arrived at the airport in Latvia on that cold January day. At that moment, they all committed their lives to the will of God and to the people of their new homeland. The following year, Rick moved forward to launch and establish the first of its kind, and eventually the largest, a Christian television network in that region of the world.
Over the years, Rick and Denise pioneered three churches, a Bible school, and a ministerial association that serves thousands of Russian-speaking pastors throughout the former USSR as well as parts of the Middle East. As Rick began training and mentoring leaders in the early days, Denise also developed a women's ministry that is actively involved in changing the lives of women and their families today. Specifically, they minister to the needs of orphans, women prisoners, the homeless, and drug-and-alcohol addicts.
Rick, Denise, and their children began as a small circle of five, willing to go beyond their comfort zone to reach the uttermost parts of the world. Today that circle includes their sons' wives, six grandchildren, and a large ministry staff that helps the Renners extend their reach as they exalt Jesus Christ as the Hope of all nations.