Life has felt pretty crappy lately.
Now let me just say that, in the grand scheme of things, my life is pretty much cupcakes and bounce houses. In a world filled with Boko Haram, school shootings, cancer, and a thousand other heart-wrenching tragedies, my life is pretty cushy.
Nevertheless, it still feels…hard.
For the last three months, we’ve had a least one child sick and home from school almost every day. On top of that, my old nemesis depression has been dogging my footsteps, making me feel like I wake up under a dark cloud.
It’s been hard to wait for the Lord to bring relief. Rest. Peace. Joy.
And I know I’m not alone. All of us have something we’re waiting for the Lord to do.
To bring a spouse.
To give life a barren womb.
To save a wandering child.
To repair a once-treasured, now shattered relationship.
We know God is faithful. We know that he’s good and he loves us. But it’s so excruciatingly hard to wait for the Lord to act. To move. To deliver. To rescue.
Thankfully, Scripture itself is a story of waiting. Abraham waited for a son, Joseph waited for deliverance, David waited to be made king, Israel waited for a Messiah, and we all wait for the return of the serpent crusher.
God’s word has much to say about how we wait. Biblical waiting isn’t passive, like waiting for a train to arrive. It’s an active, aggressive sort of waiting.
So how do we wait for the Lord in a way that honors him, fills us with hope, and gives us strength to carry on even when we feel like we’re in the dark?
Waiting For The Lord: 4 Way
1. We Wait For The Lord In Faith
There are two types of waiting.
The first type is unsure, fearful waiting. We’re not sure if God is going come through, as if he’s some sort of unreliable parent who forgets to pick up his kids at soccer practice.
We hope God delivers us…
…but what if he doesn’t?
This kind of waiting is displeasing and dishonoring to God.
The second type is waiting in strong faith. We’ve run all the numbers, calculated the odds, and can’t figure out how God is going to come through for us.
Nevertheless, we trust him because we know his character. We know that he’s infinitely good and loving and that he will deliver us, even if that deliverance isn’t the kind we expected.
Proverbs 3:5-6 spells it out clearly:
Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths.
When life is in shambles, one of our greatest temptations is to lean on our own understanding. To try to figure everything out. To play out every scenario in our heads and determine which one is most likely.
We become like divine weathermen, trying to map out which way God’s providence will blow.
But when we wait for the Lord in faith, we make a conscious effort to reject our own understanding. Our understanding is extraordinarily limited.
I mean, seriously, think about it…
We’re aware of about 1/1,000,000,000th of what is happening in every circumstance.
God knows everything that’s happening in our lives and HE knows exactly what he will do.
Waiting that honors God is characterized by faith in his character.
2. We Wait For The Lord Loudly
Have you ever noticed that when David was waiting for the Lord to deliver, he was very loud about it?
