God Knows Best: Embracing the Waiting

Why did you put this dream in my heart if I don’t ever have the opportunity to do it?

 

A question I used to ask God a lot. I couldn’t understand. I couldn’t understand how there could be something that made me come so alive and yet time after time I was let down by it. There was something inside of me that needed to be released, and for me, dance looked like it would offer that release.

If only I had the chance to learn, to perform.

Growing up the only dance classes I ever took were one year of ballet in sixth grade and scattered classes here and there offered in my church. I always wanted to learn, but I suppose I never felt like I had the opportunity, and I don’t think my parents knew how deep the desire ran, so they didn’t feel the need to put me in regular classes.

I thought my time would come when finally, after high school, I entered a one year ministry program in our church. Dancing was a big part of the ministry tour the team took every summer. Surely, I would get to dance.

So, we began to learn some choreography, and then the time came to be “picked” to be in the dances. I remember being disappointed a lot. After several times of not being picked, disillusionment began to set in.

But I’m the one who loves to dance! Some of the others have never danced in their lives, or don’t even like it.

It didn’t make sense to me. My time hadn’t come when I thought it would.

It turned out that God had other things to work on in me that year. He was not denying my desire; rather, he was working on my heart so I would be ready for his timing.

I had to trust him and to learn to be excited for other people. I also had to learn that ministry was not about my opportunity to show off my skills, but about loving people.

Waiting is not easy, especially when a fire burns inside your heart. But for me, it was necessary.

After that year, it was two more full years before I finally had the opportunity to take a regular ballet class. I was twenty-one.

The previous year I had done a second year of this ministry program in another state, in which I did have some more opportunities to dance. I was grateful for this, and yet, I knew I really needed a lot more training to hone the skill and gain strength and flexibility. I do remember at one point in the year when a dance instructor from my own church came to teach us. When he saw me dance, he said, “It’s really good to see you dance.” That meant more to me than he’ll ever know.

So at twenty-one, I took one year of ballet from an amazing instructor at my church, and the following year actually had the opportunity to go to the art school at the church and focus solely on dance. I finally had the chance to do something I know God created me to do.

Most dancers start their training early in childhood. I don’t know all the reasons why I didn’t learn until I was an adult, but I do know that while there is pain in waiting, there is also beauty. God focuses on different things with us in different seasons of our lives, and what we have to remember is that he always knows what is best for us.

In my waiting time, God taught me to trust him, to trust his heart and his love for me. He taught me to turn dance into something used to worship him and to share his heart with others, not something to draw attention to myself. He taught me grace.

Today, at twenty-five, I am still dancing. I really am amazed at how much I’ve been able to learn in such a short time and I know I will only get better as I continue to give myself to the process.

In our culture today especially, we tend to want things right away. It doesn’t feel good to wait, or to put things off, or to have to go through years of training to obtain what we want.

But it’s worth it. And if we miss the process, we miss the beauty of the gifts.

I can be content with the level of training I have in dance at this moment, knowing that this journey of learning is not over.

I’m still waiting. I’m waiting for a lot of things. But every day, if I remember to, I live loved, knowing that my Creator stands outside of time, and that he knows best.