God Is Always Right on Time - Daily Hope with Rick Warren - September 7, 2023
God Is Always Right on Time
By Rick Warren
“The vision will still happen at the appointed time. It hurries toward its goal. It won’t be a lie. If it’s delayed, wait for it. It will certainly happen. It won’t be late.” Habakkuk 2:3 (GW)
God is never in a hurry, and he’s never late.
He’s always on time.
God’s timing is perfect, even when we can’t understand it. We’ll never fully understand God’s timing because God exists on a different wavelength. Because he is timeless, he has a different view of time.
The Bible talks about God’s understanding of time in 2 Peter 3:8. It says, “Do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day” (NIV).
Does that sound like the way you treat time? It might feel like a thousand years when I’m waiting for a meal sometimes, but we humans don’t think in those terms.
God’s timelessness has big implications for your life. When God created you, he put a dream in your heart. Most people start off with a big vision and a big goal. They have some kind of dream or plan or project for their life.
What vision has God given you? Over the years I’ve discovered that while everybody tends to start off early in life with a vision, as time goes on, more and more people give up on their dream before it’s accomplished. The reason is often because it doesn’t happen fast enough.
Maybe you have had your dream battered. Maybe you have had your dream broken. Or maybe, out of discouragement and disappointment, you have buried your dream. You’ve given up on it.
God doesn’t want you to do that. If God gave you a dream for your life, it will happen. It just has to happen on his timetable, not yours.
God says this about your dream: “The vision will still happen at the appointed time. It hurries toward its goal. It won’t be a lie. If it’s delayed, wait for it. It will certainly happen. It won’t be late” (Habakkuk 2:3 GW).
When I started Saddleback Church when I was 25 years old, I was in a hurry to get everything done fast. But God said to me the same thing he will say to you with your dream: “No, it’s not all going to happen right now. But slowly, steadily, the vision will be fulfilled.”
I want you to remember this powerful truth: God is never early in your life. He is never late in your life.
God is always right on time.
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