Do you feel like you are always waiting?
Checkout line, gas pump, restaurant. Post office, carpool, tag office. Bathroom, ticket counter, roller coaster ride, even waiting for the new Fall shows to come out...is it September yet?
They are all things in life we have to sometimes wait for...I admit to sometimes being impatient during those little things in life...but most of the time, they don't really bother me all that much. Well, unless I am in a hurry and I have two kids with me, then, dear Lord, help us all. :)
But, what if the directions you were given were simply to wait? I remember when David was little and I would say, wait right here. He obliged normally. But give Noah the same directions at the same age and that kid would bolt in the opposite direction. He dislikes waiting with a passion, so I have had to become creative in the ways I ask him to wait...which normally means I better have a device ready to go, or some candy, or make up a game because it's not going to end well if I don't. Let me say too, that Noah is 7, and his waiting skills are growing, and in the grand scheme of life, he hasn't waited for anything major yet. :)
All that made me ponder this - Am I so impatient at times or so wrapped up in my own little self that God feels the need to get creative with me?
Now, let's be clear, God is God, and Creator of the Heavens and the Earth, so He is already creative just by being God. But I often find myself saying things to my kids or to the youth I lead, the same things God says to me when it comes to waiting, being patient, and enduring...and I trust some of that is because He has lavishly loved me through some difficult times of waiting.
A quick search for passages in the Bible about waiting will produce about 125 verses, many of them in the Old Testament. Waiting for perfect timing, waiting for cleansing, waiting for someone's return, the king waits, the servants wait, the wicked lie in wait, they are waiting on salvation and waiting on the Lord. At times, the Lord says "Wait here for me" and other times He said "Go there and wait for me". The passages I love are some that say..."And they waited." It doesn't say they set up tent, although that may be likely...it also doesn't say how they entertained themselves, or what they did while they waited! RIGHT? We are supposed to be doing something while we wait, RIGHT?
Sometimes.
I wrote earlier this year about how I felt like I was waiting on God, but really, He was actually waiting on me. When I first began processing that, it saddened me to know that God was actually waiting on me. I want to be a person that is prepared and ready for whatever God wants to do in and through me...but I was admittedly stuck in a place where I was so consumed with what I wanted God to do, instead of being consumed in whatever He was doing already. He had been writing a beautiful story in my life and I was so busy doing that life, but being frustrated through it, instead of embracing what He was writing. When my focus shifted, it became easier to wait and do what He was calling me to, even though the surrounding circumstances did not change.
And so we wait.
We wait only for the Lord. We wait expectantly - anticipating His return to us, to heal the land, and reunite all whom believe in Him.
Psalm 27:14 - Wait for the Lord, be strong and take heart, and wait for the Lord.
Psalm 33:20 - We wait in hope for the Lord, he is our help and our shield.
Isaiah 26:8 - Yes, Lord, walking in the way of your laws, we wait for you; your name and renown are the desires of our hearts. (See www.268generation.com)
Be encouraged that whatever you are waiting on - whether it be graduation, the opportunity to date, waiting for Mr/Mrs right, the adoption of a child, the salvation of a loved one, a positive pregnancy test, or even to pay off your debt...the Lord is over it all. He has it all planned out and He is not surprised by the slightest bump in the road - all of those are reasons for His glory to shine bright. In waiting expectantly for Him, our hearts and minds will be in the right position for Him to guide and lead us in ways we never expected! Come Lord Jesus!
Until then...we wait.
Love,
Karen
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