Have you put a great deal of time, emotion, and energy into a project that you just knew God intended, only to have it fizzle out prematurely? Suddenly you’re confused: Did you misunderstand God? Did you do something wrong that caused Him to abort the mission?

“I did all that for nothing,” you say, as though the process itself amounts to nothing because your expectations haven’t been met. But sometimes the process is as crucial as the end result.

Remember that, during the Israelites’ forty years in the wilderness, the Lord required them to pull up stakes whenever the cloud moved, whether that was twelve hours (see Num. 9:21), two days, a month, or a year after they’d settled in (see v. 22). They never knew when the cloud might move, but “as soon as it lifted, they broke camp and moved on” (v. 22, NLT).

Imagine the satisfaction of finally completing pens for the livestock and digging up the hard ground for a well — and then feeling the brisk wind that preceded the moving of the cloud of God.

Today, if you feel like you’ve invested yourself in a dream only to see it dissolve, remember that the Lord’s definition of “completion” is different than your own. You can’t always know why He moves you on before you’ve seen a task through to completion (as you imagine it should look), but the key is to move when He does and go where He goes.

“The Lord will guide you continually” (Isa. 58:11, NKJV).