“Keep you fork. The best is yet to come.” I’ve heard it a couple of times during messages to illustrate hopeful anticipation for what God has in store – as a chef tells his patron to wait for the dessert, which most people often refer to as the best part of the whole dining experience.
Author’s note: This was inspired by a conversation I had with a friend over lunch a couple of weeks ago.
Our Christian walk doesn’t necessarily make us immune to feelings of discouragement. Surely, there are situations that will throw us off and can potentially lead us to be sidetracked from following Christ. When things get tough and seemingly unbearable, that is when we are most likely to falter. We tend to believe the lie that we are not worth anything, even if we know that it is what it is – a lie.
Yes, we’re not immune to these things. We are, after all, still living in this world, along with its ways.
But though we are not immune, Christ’s love for us protects us from sinking and yielding from such discouragements, depression and feelings of self-pity.
We are heirs of God’s Kingdom. Romans 8:16-17 tells us, “The Spirit himself testifies with our spirit that we are God’s children. Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.”
Jesus saw us as someone worth saving. We are worth the precious blood of Christ, and by His blood we become part of the greatest family – His family.
We are God’s masterpiece, and He will bring us to completion. Philippians 1:6 tells us that God, who has started to work in us, will continue to work in us into Christ-likeness.
I’ve come to know about Ludwig Van Beethoven’s near obsessive editing in composing his musical scores from an article I read early in February. He was brutal in honing his ideas, and it showed in his manuscripts – including the recovered working score for a piano version of “Grosse Fuge,” or grand fugue. quoting the article:
“Groups of measures throughout the 80-page manuscript are furiously canceled out with cross-marks. Remnants of red sealing wax, used to adhere long corrections to an already scuffed up page, remain like scars. There are smudges where he rubbed away ink while it was still wet and abrasions where he erased notes with a needle. Dated changes and omissions are scattered throughout the score, many of these markings dating to the final months before his death in 1827.” (1)
No matter how messed up we are, God is at work. And in the midst of the mess that is our life, a masterpiece only done by God’s hands will ultimately surface.
We are worth the fork. James 1:2-4 says, “Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.”
The rejections we experience and the feelings of discouragement are part of building us up until we are complete, lacking in nothing – perfected by the One who is perfect. We are continually being perfected by the One who is not afraid to get His Hands dirty with the mess we have in our lives.
We have been told to keep our fork, but has it ever occurred to us that when God said “the best is yet to come”, He was referring to us? That we are being reserved for the one whom God has told to keep his/her fork? He is telling the other person to wait, because we are worth holding on to that fork.
