Embracing God's Timing in Your Artistic Journey

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Do you find yourself growing impatient with God's timing in your artistic journey? You're not alone. That frustration—wanting success now, progress immediately, recognition instantly—is something almost every artist battles.

Through personal studio revelations and spiritual insights, this episode explores how God uses the textured, broken places in our lives to create the most beautiful aspects of our art and testimony. Just as a painter uses texture to hold color and create depth, God uses our challenging seasons to reveal His glory in ways that smooth paths never could.

The enemy wants you to believe you're behind schedule, too old, or somehow disqualified from your artistic calling. But God's timing—whether in sudden breakthroughs or extended journeys—is perfectly aligned with His purposes for your life. When we release our timetables and focus instead on faithful daily actions, we position ourselves for sustainable growth rather than exhausting spurts of striving.

Those winter seasons in your creative life aren't just waiting periods—they're strategic opportunities. Historical basket makers understood this, using winter's confinement to build inventory that would sustain them through other seasons. Similarly, your apparent delays can become divine appointments for skill refinement and creative exploration that busier seasons wouldn't permit.

The texture of your artistic journey—with all its winters and valleys—isn't something to escape but something to embrace. Every delay has purpose, every setback contains potential, and every season plays its role in revealing His glory through your creative expression. When we trust the Master's timing, we discover that sometimes the long way home is actually the most beautiful path forward.

Subscribe to the Thriving Christian Artist podcast, where we're raising up an army of artists to reveal God's glory in the earth. Will you join us in this transformative journey?

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to the Thriving Christian Artist, the
podcast, where we hope youconnect with God to bust through
the roadblocks that have heldyou back for years, create the
work you love and really livethe life you know.
God created you to live as anartist in His kingdom.
I'm Matt Tama, your host.
Let's get started.
Well, hey, my friend, welcometo the podcast, so glad that

(00:24):
you're here.
You know, one of the thingsthat I see all the time in my
life and in the lives of so manyof the artists that we walk
with, either in our foundations,course and community or the
artist mentoring program, isfrustration with the timing of
God in their life.
I don't know if you're like meor you're like a lot of other
artists, but doggone it.

(00:44):
I don't know if you're like meor you're like a lot of other
artists, but doggone it.
We want things now and we wantthings quickly and we want
things in the way and on thetime frame on the calendar that
we think is best for our life.
And if you've been walking withthe Lord for any length of time
, you realize that God's timingis not always our timing and
that doesn't mean necessarilythat God just takes a long time
for things to get done.

(01:05):
Sometimes, you know, he can domore in a suddenly than we can
in years of striving right.
He can just boom, releasesomething quickly that we didn't
even realize was on the radarof our life.
And then other times he lovesto take us through this
beautiful process of walking ajourney and working out those

(01:26):
rough places and those crevicesin our life, those kind of
places that are rough in ourlife.
He loves to take us through ajourney where he can deal with
those things, where we can seethe foolishness of our ways,
where he can allow us to let goof habits and mindsets and ways
of viewing life, ourself and God, our art, all those things in

(01:48):
order to really come intoalignment with who he is.
There's a beautiful new song out.
The last few weeks If you'vefollowed me on Facebook and
Instagram, you've seen me shareit by a worship artist named
Natalie Jane, and I just love itand I get nothing.
I have no affiliation, I havewith her, but uh, I just am so

(02:12):
in love with this song.
It's called, uh, the long wayhome and it's on her brand new
album.
I think it's uh, her albumscalled all joy.
But um, man, what an incrediblealbum.
But this song Call the Long WayHome.
It talks about this frustrationthat we have with the timing of

(02:32):
God.
But she's got this one part inthere that says she's kind of
talking about her own journeyand she says take me down the
long way if the long way leadsto you.
And I was like, oh, oh, you'rekilling me.
In a good way, you're killingme, but you know it.

(02:53):
Just, it just really drew meback into the presence of the
Lord the other day and say, god,I want to come into a place
afresh in my life where, nomatter if I can see the vision
or not, whether I've got a planin my hand from you and I'm
executing on that, or whetherall I have is a promise and the
hope of faith in my life thatyou are good and you're doing
something.
God, I trust the journey thatyou have me on and I trust that

(03:17):
you're working all thingstogether for my good, no matter
if it's happening like I thinkit should happen or if it's
happening in a way that isunknown and unfamiliar to me.
So I want to give you threethings you know I think will
help you in that today.
The first thing is that youknow we've got to trust God's
timing when it comes to growth,even when the journey feels slow

(03:40):
, because In those times, inthose places where we are in the
cracks and crevices of life, inthe valley moments, in these
moments where we don'tunderstand, those are often the
times that God does his deepestwork.
You know, I was in the studiothe other day working on a set
of really studies in the coldwax paintings that I do, just

(04:03):
trying to get a little moredepth of color and texture and
some more interesting surfacesfor these new pieces I've
created in this recent series.
And the Lord just reminded me.
He said you know these texturesthat you love to create in your
painting, these textures thatare often ugly and cracked and
don't make a lot of sense.

(04:24):
Some of them you cover up, someof them you celebrate whatever.
Those are the most beautifulplaces in your work and those
are a reflection of what I'mdoing in your life.
In other words, I'm using allthese, shall we say, broken
moments and these moments wherethings aren't perfect, where we
don't quite understand what'sgoing on.

(04:44):
I'm using those to reveal mygoodness, reveal my glory,
reveal my strength in the placesthat you feel weak and broken.
And you know, the more Istarted thinking about that, I'm
like wow, you know, the wholepoint for me as an artist in
putting texture is my work isthat so it not only can hold the
viewer's interest but it alsoholds color.

(05:07):
Those textures and cracks forme are what holds the glazes, of
, what allows these beautifulglazes to kind of come over and
soften and unify the work.
And all of a sudden, theseplaces that we didn't quite know
what to do with when a glazecomes over it, oh, like it, it
just becomes beautiful.

(05:27):
And I I was like Lord, you'respeaking to me.
You're speaking to me righthere in the middle of the studio
.
That is in these brokentextural places, the texture of
our life, that your glory ismade manifest and magnified
through us.
The second thing I think is isreally important is that we have
to, as an act of our will, Ithink, on a daily basis and

(05:49):
maybe even moment by moment, yougot to learn to intentionally
release the timeline of yourdevelopment as an artist and
your potential growth as an artbusiness owner.
You got to release that to theLord and focus on the faithful,
focus on the small action.
Focus on the daily things thatyou are doing that are bringing

(06:14):
you closer to the Lord.
Why?
Because we know that when we'refaithful, with little, god
makes his ruler over much.
Fruit doesn't happen in yourlife because you try harder.
Fruit is produced through yourlife as the natural action
outcome of closeness andfaithfulness to the Lord.
That is huge for you tounderstand.

(06:35):
The enemy will always try to getyou to work in striving, always
try to get you to compareyourself to others, always make
you think that you're behind,you're missed it, you're too old
, you're somehow disqualified.
That is his game.
And so realize, when you feelthose things, you have a choice.
You can either, as we say inthe South, wallow around in it

(06:58):
and just keep planting thoseseeds in your heart and just
treating them like they're thetruth, or you can answer those
things with a response from hisword that says nope.
I know that you're working allthings together for my good.
I know that, even though Idon't see it, you're moving in
my life.
I know that my faithfulnessproduces fruit, not my striving,
not my trying harder.
I know that I don't have to bejealous of others that are

(07:21):
seemingly walking in a season offruitfulness in their life,
because that is coming in mylife as I continue to walk with
you.
Listen, you got to learn tostir yourself up in your faith
and I think, again, that's oneof the big, big, big parts of
being a part of a community thatwe see is that, oh my gosh,
when you're walking in communitywith people, you can encourage

(07:44):
and support one another when youdon't feel like it inside.
And then, number three, I wouldjust say this.
And then number three, I wouldjust say this using seasons of
waiting is really a greatopportunity to refine your
skills, deepen your faith, buildup information in your life
that you're trying to learnabout, marketing and business

(08:04):
and connecting with newgalleries and all this stuff.
In other words, to build astrong foundation.
See, winter seasons in your lifeare often scary.
Right, they feel desolate, theyfeel dark, they feel like God's
not at work, they feel likewe're out alone, the snow and
the wind and the ice, and, oh,it's just going to get us.

(08:25):
And we're like God, get me tothe spring, get me to the summer
.
But you know one of the thingsthat the Lord showed me years
ago, just as a basket maker,when we moved to Asheville,
north Carolina, I started seeingthese historical pictures of
people that were basket makersback in the 1800s, early 1900s.
And these were not professionalartists, you know what they

(08:45):
were.
They were farmers andhomesteaders who, in the winter,
when they couldn't get out anddo the other stuff that they
were doing, they would makebaskets.
Baskets was winter work.
It was a thing that you did sothat you could sit by the fire,
stay warm.
And in fact there's these greatpictures of historically, of

(09:06):
people making these baskets inthese one room cabins up in the
mountains and their whole housewas just filled floor to ceiling
, front to back, with basketsthat they were making in order
to be able to sell in the springand in the summer.
And I'm like, wow God, what apicture of your kingdom that our
winter seasons can be timeswhere we're building up our

(09:28):
inner inventory, where we'rebuilding up our art, where we're
able to create new work, we'reable to explore and do things
that we could never do inseasons of fruitfulness, in
order to realize that thosethings are going to accelerate
us and prepare us for theseasons of spring, of sprouting
and of harvest that are coming.
We know they're coming right.

(09:50):
For everything there's a season, but we have to trust the Lord
in the middle of that.
So, rather than despising thesewinter seasons, do the things
that you never get to do andtrust God in the process that he
is at work.
Listen, my friend, the morethat you trust God in the
texture of your life, the morethat you learn to trust his

(10:11):
timing, release the timeframe ofyour art career and your art
development to him and learn touse those seasons of waiting,
those seasons of not yet in yourlife, to build foundation.
You are promised by God's wordthat you're going to be growing
in maturity and that you'regoing to be co-laboring with him
as he's using all thingstogether for your good.

(10:33):
My friend, I hope that thisencourages you today, wherever
you are in your journey.
Make sure that you're subscribedhere to the Thriving Christian
Artist podcast and, hey, makesure that you're sharing these
episodes with your friends.
Let them know that this podcast, for so many years, has been,
and continues to be, anencouragement in your life.

(10:55):
My heart, my calling in life isto raise up an army of artists
to reveal God's glory in theearth, and we do that not
through just cool marketing andbusiness tips, although we're
training on those all the time,both here and in the mentoring
program.
But we do that by teaching youhow to co-labor with the kingdom
of God and see transformationhappen in your life from the

(11:17):
inside out, the way God designed.
Hey, my friend, I love you.
Join me again and remember tillnext time.
You were created to thrive.
Bye, hey.
Thanks so much for spending afew minutes with me today on the
podcast Listen.
I hope it's been a hugeencouragement to you on your
journey as an artist.
Hey, also, before you leave,make sure to hit the subscribe
button so you don't miss any ofthe other episodes of the

(11:40):
Thriving Christian Artistpodcast, and also be sure to
connect with me on Facebook,instagram or at my website,
which is matttommymentoringcom.
Until next time, remember youwere created to thrive.
Bye-bye, thank you.