The surrounding blessing and the slow hand of God

Inertia.

Van Gogh sold just a single painting in his life/artist career.

Edward Hopper didn’t get “discovered” until he was in his mid-thirties.

Cezanne, Monet, the list goes on for the masters who started so late and found success at ages that are a bit bewildering.

But Bieber blew up at 12.

This is the conversation I have with my friend Joel pretty much every week, and it’s never not a reminder for me.

The inertia of God is unstoppable, his hand will not be swayed or inhibited. He does when He wants because He is, that’s about it. Bieber didn’t make it, nor did any of the masters, though they were delivered at their time and in His time. It’s stark, it’s kind of Christianese, but it’s brutally true. In moments where I find myself wanting deliverance, I am reminded of these people and His inertia. The one thing all of them have in common is they did the work, showed up to what they felt like they needed to do, and did it. God decides when the reward comes, however he’s constantly lavishing blessing, which is the second reminder for me.

In the same second I want deliverance, there are at least a hundred things I can look around me and point out as an undeserved gift. That doesn’t dissipate the hope to finally crest the summit of where I’d like to be artistically, however it does put me back into perspective of the value and purpose of living - it’s not about me, yet I’m overwhelmingly loved and blessed by God.

I want to experience him more - both in the wanting and the blessing. I get focused on what it means to make it, and I forget that it’s just pure vanity. I won’t be able to add anything eternally to me by achieving a single thing here on earth, so why fret so much about it? Easy to say and sound smart on the internet, but watch me try and implement it on the daily and you’d laugh hysterically. I’m a hurricane of confusion.

I’m almost a mid-thirties guy, so maybe my time is just around the corner, but does it matter? Yes. No. Both. God please help me to seek what’s true, experience you more, and relish in the beauty I seek always because it’s just under my nose.