A Sense of Timing

John Maxwell says being a leader requires more than the ability to motivate people. Effective leaders must lead other people to the right plan at the right time. Maxwell explains it this way:

• The wrong plan at the wrong time creates problems.
• The right plan at the wrong time is premature.
• The wrong plan at the right time is polarizing.
• The right plan at the right time results in progress.

The priority of the right plan at the right moment reminds me of those familiar words from Galatians 4:4. "But when the fulness of time had come, God sent forth his son, born of woman, born under the law." The power of the incarnation of Christ was about the birth of a child to a virgin, and yet it was about so much more.

The eternal inventor of biology could have planted an embryo in a virgin at any moment during all the thousands of years when the world was awaiting a savior. It was a miracle for us, not for him. Instead, God waited until the time was full:

• The Greeks has spread the Greek language across the known world so that, at the right moment, everyone would be able to read or understand the Gospel in Greek.
• The Romans had united much of the world under one emblem so that borders were easily crossed by evangelists.
• Roman roads made travel easier for preachers and teachers, and Roman soldiers dispersed around the known world made it safer.
• And at the first moment all the advantages were in place, God planted the seed and lighted the match.

And so Jesus was the right idea at the most opportune moment in history. God planned it all and brought it about when time was full.

You and I sometimes confuse the right timing with "my timing." And its' true, a little energy and a bit of ingenuity can make interesting things happen. But when our plans are bathed in prayer and alligned the the eternal purposes of God's heart, they always accomplish more and bring about eternal benefits. The trick is being discerning enough, and patient enough, to seek God's timing for our "big ideas."

David wrote in Psalm 27:14, "Wait for the Lord. Be strong and let your heart take courage. Wait for the Lord!" Those lyrics are as powerful today as it was when the warrior king first sang them. It's an idea that would make us all more prayerful, more patient, and...yes, more powerful. Wait upon the Lord and look for the moments when the time is full.