MEET ANNIE

Annie Meadows grew up in Bellevue, Washington and went to school at the University of Washington. Shortly after graduating, she moved to Buena Vista, Colorado to work for Young Life. She is in the midst of figuring out what her next step is, but is happily living in the mountains spending lots of time skiing, baking sourdough, practicing gratitude, and drinking lots of coffee.

I live in a small mountain town in Colorado. My sweet little town is charming and beautiful, located right between the Collegiate Peaks and the Arkansas River. With all the biking, hiking, and rafting available, our town triples in population over the summer.

It’s difficult for locals to find a parking spot on main street, as tourists flood in, eager to enjoy all the fun summer activities Colorado has to offer. However, once the leaves begin to change and the snow begins to fall, we transition from summer to autumn, and autumn to winter, and the number of visitors begins to drop significantly. Businesses shorten their hours, you hardly have to wait in line anywhere, and life begins to move at a much slower pace.

The Collegiate Mountain Range next to my small town

During the craziness of summer, all I could wish for was winter, yearning for the stillness and slowness it would bring. Now here we are and I find myself impatiently waiting, quite ready for the busy to be back.

I recently finished the book, The Liturgy of the Ordinary, written by Tish Harrison Warren. The entire book is wonderful, but I was especially convicted reading the chapter titled: Sitting In Traffic – Liturgical Time and an Unhurried God. Warren writes, “We are impatient people. We want happiness now. Fulfillment and gratification now. Time is just another commodity that we seek to maximize. I get angry in traffic because it reminds me that time is not at my bidding.”

For my current season of life, it’s not traffic that is making me angry, but sitting alone in the gift shop I work in, irritated and restless as the time passes slowly and hardly any customers come in. We live in a world where hurry is glamorized and it feels easier to be busy than to be still. We have falseownership of time, mistakenly believing that we have any control over it.

In this season I find myself in, I am reminded of the story of Moses and the Israelites wandering through the wilderness for 40 years. What a long time to be in a season of waiting! If the Israelites had gotten their way, I’m sure their time in the desert would not have lasted so long. But God knew exactly what He was doing. He provided exactly what the Israelites needed for each day, in the form of manna, which is defined as “ divinely supplied spiritual nourishment”. And all in the right timing, He led them into the Promised Land.

Our God is not in a hurry. All throughout the Bible, Jesus has places to go but he walks, never runs. He embraces interruptions, takes time to be away in solitude and in prayer, and he waits. I want to be more like Jesus and learn to be content in the waiting. I want to more quickly turn to prayer than turn to scroll on my phone. I want to genuinely view time as a gift and not as something to be burdened by. I will receive the manna that God has for me each day, and trust that He is always good in keeping His promises.

“I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want.” – Philippians 4:12

So here I am, learning to enjoy the waiting instead of resent it. Learning to appreciate the slowness, instead of wishing it away. Feeling thankful for how God shows up in the ordinary and the mundane as I drink my cup of coffee and get to look out my kitchen window to this view.

My encouragement to you would be that whatever season you find yourself in, busy or slow, that you would seek to be content, because our God is good, and He continues to teach us and grow us in the waiting.

Written by Annie Meadows for The Anchor Journal

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