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Ever feel like entire years — even decades — of your life were wasted? That God’s purposes were put on hold, and you have nothing to show for a good part of your life?

Me too. But I’m comforted by how common this experience seems to be among God’s people.

Moses was on the fast track to making a difference with his life. God had already been at work in his life, not only saving him but putting him in a strategic position to wield influence. His ambition led to a tragic error, which led to decades in the wilderness as a fugitive. These years must have seemed like a waste, but God used these years to prepare Moses for his future assignment.

When God delivered Israel from Egypt after 400 years (Exodus 12:40), they faced an 11-day journey to the land God had promised them (Deuteronomy 1:2). Due to their sin, the journey took 40 years.

The pattern continues. The story of Israel, with all its ups and downs, unfolded over centuries. Someone has called the Intertestamental era “400 silent years,” years of longing and waiting. When Jesus finally came, he spent decades of his life in obscurity. When God saved Saul, soon to become Paul, a missionary to the Gentiles, he seemed to disappear from view for three years (Galatians 1:17-18).

God doesn’t seem to be in a rush with his people. He even seems to bring good out of time that we consider wasted.

“Lost years can never be restored literally,” says Charles Spurgeon. “Time once past is gone for ever … You cannot have back your time, but there is a strange and wonderful way in which God can give back to you the wasted blessings, the unripened fruits of years over which you mourned.”

I’m not arguing that wasted years are always good. Israel’s time in the wilderness, for instance, was clearly a result of their disobedience (Numbers 13:33). And yet even those years of discipline aren’t completely wasted. By the time Israel entered the Promised Land, for instance, Egypt was weakening. “The pharaohs stopped major expeditions into the land of Canaan, which now allowed Israel a providential opportunity to gain a foothold in the land” (NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible).

We don’t often see what God is doing in the years we consider wasted, but that doesn’t mean that he’s not working. As John Piper once tweeted, “God is always doing 10,000 things in your life, and you may be aware of three of them.”

As much as possible, make the best use of the limited time that God has given you (Ephesians 5:15-16). But don’t think that God isn’t at work in the times that we consider wasted. God doesn’t seem to be in as big a rush as we are. God may yet weave together a more beautiful story than we can imagine through the years that we consider wasted. One day we’ll see what God was doing in the times we thought were wasted.

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