Learning how to wait in an instant-gratification culture can be tricky. I have a hard time waiting for my microwave popcorn to pop let alone waiting for a put-on-pause-passion to come to life. Waiting on a God-planted dream that isn’t making forward progress is hard. What is God doing while I’m waiting?
Waiting is in the heart of the beholder.
We believe that once we have an idea, a dream, or a passion, it should start taking shape immediately, especially if it’s one that God placed in our heart. However, what we consider “waiting for things to get started” is actually what God considers “perfect timing.”
According to Wendy Pope in Wait and See: Finding Peace in God’s Pauses and Plans, waiting is actually, “more about experiencing God than enduring the delay.” Waiting is basically faith boot camp—God uses it to train us to trust Him.
Waiting is not easy.
Ask me to show you someone who waits well, and we’ll be standing around for a while. Achievers, those who lean more on self and less on the God of amazing grace, prefer fastly-moving productivity. As Pope writes, “Waiting… is difficult when we feel God has called us to something different. Many of us Jesus girls are doers, created with a nature to fix, nurture, and make things happen.”
God uses waiting to reveal our hearts.
Waiting reveals the sin of self-reliance. We start second-guessing ourselves and God. We wonder if we heard Him right or if we’re desiring something outside of His will or if we’re doing enough. These questions have everything to do with us and nothing to do with the Him.
Waiting reveals the sin of idolatry. When I’m in a season of wait, pretty much all I’m thinking about is the thing I’m waiting for. Where is the new ministry, the next step, the leadership position I’m holding out for? As Lysa TerKeurst writes in Uninvited: Living Loved When You Feel Less Than, Left Out and Lonely, “What is holding my attention is what I’m truly worshipping.” More often than not, I’m uninterested in what God is doing in me, but I am interested in achieving my goal and moving on to the next thing.
While we’re waiting, God reveals our sin so we can confess it and be free.
God uses waiting to protect us.
After the Israelites left Egypt, God took them on the longer Red Sea route instead of the shorter go-through-the-Philistine-camp road. God knew their weary and fearful hearts, but He took the long way for their good and His glory. What will you miss if you try to circumvent God for an easier route? As Pope writes, “A rush through the wait has the potential to stunt our spiritual growth and dull our sense to what God wants us to learn as a result of our wait.”
While we’re waiting, God grows our trust in Him.
God uses waiting to draw us closer to Him.
While I long for my dream to become a reality and for my wait to be over, God whispers that He has something even more amazing in store for my life. As TerKeurst writes, “He will not let our need for divine, deep love, meant to be fulfilled by Him alone, be cheaply met by lesser things.” My dreams don’t seem lesser in my mind, but when they replace God as the source of my comfort, hope, and joy, that’s what they become. He is our Creator who longs to be in a relationship with us, to enjoy us, to know us, and for us to know Him.
While we’re waiting, God strengthens our relationship.
But waiting doesn’t magically produce these good things.
Waiting alone won’t reveal our heart, protect us, or draw us closer to God. We have to agree to trust that God has a purpose for everything that He’s doing. We have to trust that He’s always working on our behalf. But waiting can just as easily devolve into angst and frustration too, so we have a choice: anxiety or trust?
Achiever-Friend, we love instant gratification, but that isn’t our reality. Waiting is difficult. So what is God doing in our wait? He’s working it for our good. Using it to cleanse us from sin, protect us from ourselves, and draw us nearer to God. If we let Him.
