Taking Ground | Week 5
DAY 1
“Man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.” -1 Samuel 16:7
Life today is lived in fragments—carefully selected moments stitched together to tell a story that feels complete.
We scroll past smiles that seem effortless, families that look peaceful, careers that appear to move in a straight line. Platforms like Instagram and Pinterest are built to showcase finished products. The reveal. The result. The after photo.
What we don’t see are the dozens of attempts that didn’t work.
The conversations that ended in silence.
The nights when doubt lingered longer than faith.
We know this. We even laugh about it. We remind ourselves that social media isn’t real life.
And yet, somehow, we still believe everyone else’s story is real—while ours feels unfinished.
Comparison thrives in that contradiction. We assume our lives are delayed because they still look like works in progress, while everyone else appears to have arrived. We measure our behind-the-scenes against everyone else’s highlight reel and quietly conclude that something must be wrong with us.
That mindset doesn’t stay on our screens. It follows us into church.
We sit in rows and tell ourselves stories we have no evidence for:
“That family has it all together. I wish ours did.”
“My friend’s life feels like an unbroken boulevard of green lights.”
“That message was powerful—but it wouldn’t work in my life.”
Comparison doesn’t just make us feel inferior; it subtly convinces us that God is more active in other people’s lives than in our own.
Even Scripture can fall into this pattern. We gravitate toward the moments that feel victorious—the verses that inspire, energize, and resolve tension quickly. One of the most famous is Moses parting the Red Sea. It’s dramatic. It’s miraculous. It’s the moment that gets people on their feet.
Exodus 14:21–22 is often preached as a triumphant ending:
“Then Moses raised his hand over the sea, and the Lord opened up a path… So the people of Israel walked through the middle of the sea on dry ground, with walls of water on each side.”
That passage is breathtaking. But it is also a highlight reel.
What often gets skipped is everything that led up to that moment. The fear. The delay. The sense of being trapped. The long night where nothing seemed to be happening.
Scripture tells us the wind blew all night long.
That detail matters.
God did not part the sea instantly. There was a stretch of time where the people stood in darkness, listening to the sound of the wind, unable to see what God was doing. They had no Bible app. No future chapter to reference. No reassurance that it would all work out.
They were living the story—not quoting it.
And that’s where many of us find ourselves.
We’re not standing on the shore celebrating yet. We’re somewhere between Egypt and deliverance. Between what God promised and what we can see. Between obedience and understanding.
And when we compare our middle to someone else’s ending, discouragement sets in.
We begin to believe delay means denial.
That waiting means weakness.
That if God were truly with us, life would look more finished by now.
But God has never evaluated stories by how they look halfway through.
He looks at the heart.
He looks at formation.
He looks at who we are becoming—not just what we are accomplishing.
The unseen work matters to God.
The slow work matters to God.
The parts of your life that feel unpostable—the doubt, the detours, the questions—are not evidence of failure. They are often the very places where God is shaping depth, resilience, and trust.
God does not rush people to make them impressive.
He forms people to make them faithful.
And the chapters that feel unfinished today may one day become the testimony—but only because God was working long before the breakthrough ever appeared.
This journey doesn’t begin with a miracle.
It begins with trust.
And God is just as present in the waiting as He is in the victory.
