Even When I Don't See It, You're Working

My three year old and I planted cress seeds last week. We put them in soil, watered them, and he immediately asked, "Where are they?" I explained they're under the dirt, growing, but we can't see them yet. He wasn't convinced.

The next couple of days he kept checking, expecting to see something. "But where ARE they?" To him, if he couldn't see them, nothing was happening.

But, a few days later, tiny green shoots appeared. The dots began to connect for him. They were there all along, working beneath the surface, even when he couldn't see any evidence of growth.

I laugh about his impatience with seeds, but when I think about my life, I'm not that different. I want visible progress. I want to see things moving, changing, improving.

I want evidence that God is working, answered prayers, open doors, clear direction. And when I don't see it, when things look the same day after day, I start to wonder: Is anything actually happening?

But God's most important work often happens in the invisible places. Joseph didn't see God working during thirteen years of slavery and prison. The Israelites didn't see God working during four hundred years in Egypt. Mary and Martha didn't see God working during the four days Lazarus lay in the tomb. In every case, what looked like silence was actually preparation beneath the surface.

Isaiah 64:4 says, "No eye has seen any God besides you, who acts on behalf of those who wait for him." God acts on behalf of those who wait. Not just those who see Him working, but those who wait, trusting He's working even when they can't perceive it.

Just like those cress seeds growing underground, or eggs developing quietly in a nest, hidden, protected, being formed in ways no one can see, God is working.

Beneath the surface of our circumstances, beyond our limited view, He's orchestrating, preparing, developing what will one day emerge. And when it does, we'll realize: He was working all along.