Even in the Waiting
Do you like waiting? Of course you don’t. Neither do I. There is much psychology behind this idea of waiting, but I will not delve too deeply into that today other than to say we often view waiting as an imposition. Waiting in line at the grocery store. Calling customer service and being told you are number six in the queue. A delayed flight. They all seem more like torture. The worst in us often comes out in this kind of waiting. What is road rage? Often nothing more than impatience which leads us to say or do things that are not becoming of us.
But there is also “good” waiting. Waiting that allows us to better prepare for something. Think about the athlete who works hard every day in practice, improving their skills, stuck behind the all-star player, waiting two seasons to finally become the starter.
There are two kinds of waiting – passive and active. I will define the passive form as simply waiting for something to occur (waiting in line) whereas the active form is doing something to prepare ourselves in order to better make use of a future opportunity (my athlete scenario above).
We tend to become negative and cynical in passive waiting. We become impatient. Again, think road rage. Active waiting chooses to believe that there is a beneficial purpose in the delay, allowing us to be (somewhat) patient amid the waiting.
The world around us never seems to be in any hurry to give us what we want, need, desire. God too never seems to be in any hurry. At least in a hurry according to my definition of hurry – something like tomorrow is fine, but today, even better! God’s timing very often differs from our timing. He knows the best time for things to happen: “There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens” (Ecclesiastes 3:1).
For those of who wait upon God, our waiting could be passive, meaning we just sit and wait for God to act. But I believe that God desires to use our waiting to keep us in step with Him. He wants our waiting to be active, asking “What are You trying to accomplish in this time of wait?”
God gives purpose to our waiting. He works in our waiting as well. And because we are waiting on a faithful God, there is hope in our waiting. Psalm 130:5-6 tells us so – “I wait for the Lord, my whole being waits, and in his word I put my hope. I wait for the Lord more than watchmen wait for the morning, more than watchmen wait for the morning.” Do you see it – waiting, hoping, watching.
Isaiah 40:31 puts the hope we can have this way: “But those who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.”
Psalm 27 is a great place for us to turn to when we are forced to wait. In this psalm, David expresses his confidence in God as his source of all that he needs, even as he waits to see those blessings. I will break this psalm down into four sections:
(1) Trust in the Lord (vv.1-3);
(2) Seek the Lord (4-6);
(3) Pray to the Lord (7-12);
(4) And now for most of us, the hard one – Confident waiting on the Lord (13-14): “I remain confident of this: I will see the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living. Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the LORD.”
I encourage you to read the entire psalm (click the highlighted link above), looking for the four themes I have referenced. And let this psalm boost your confidence in the Lord, even in the waiting!
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