Wait for the LORD

"Wait for the LORD; be strong, and let your heart take courage; yes, wait for the LORD." (Psalm 27:14, )

None of us likes to wait.

We are a nation of people who believe everything must be done as quickly as possible. We rush to fast-food restaurants only to wait in the drive-thru line for our order. We routinely drive over the speed limit because the posted speed seems impossibly slow to us. We even communicate via e-mail or instant messenger rather than a hand-written note because it is infinitely faster than "snail mail."

Have you ever been to a big city such as San Francisco or New York City? The typical mode of transportation is your own two feet or maybe hailing a cab. Very few people drive because it's difficult to find a place to park.

I've always been amused when waiting for the "Don't Walk" light to turn to "Walk." There are those who repeatedly push the button that changes the light as if they're hoping that pressing it over and over again will cause the light to immediately change in their favor. Some people step off the curb as they're waiting so that they'll have a head start when the light does change. And then there are those who are so impatient to get across that they won't wait for the "Walk" light to appear. They start across, dodging vehicles if they have to, but they don't care. They beat the rest of us over to the other side!

It strikes me that this is similar to the way we often approach God when seeking an answer to prayer. We bombard Him over and over again with our prayer requests, similar to the person who keeps pushing that light-changing button. We think that hounding God with our requests might just wear Him down and we'll get our answer more quickly.

Then there are others who know God will answer their prayer, but in hopes that the answer will be what they want, they step out ahead of His timing. These are like those who step off the curb while waiting for the "Walk" light to appear.

When we rush headlong into our own agenda without waiting for God to make His will known to us, we're just like those folks who perilously charge through that intersection without regard for the traffic situation. In both cases, we know what we want so we do what we think it takes to reach our goal. Just where is God in this situation?

"Then it came about at the end of forty days, that Noah opened the window of the ark which he had made; and he sent out a raven, and it flew here and there until the water was dried up from the earth. Then he sent out a dove from him, to see if the water was abated from the face of the land; but the dove found no resting place for the sole of her foot, so she returned to him into the ark; for the water was on the surface of all the earth. Then he put out his hand and took her, and brought her into the ark to himself.

"So he waited yet another seven days; and again he sent out the dove from the ark. And the dove came to him toward evening; and behold, in her beak was a freshly picked olive leaf. So Noah knew that the water was abated from the earth. Then he waited yet another seven days, and sent out the dove; but she did not return to him again.

"Now it came about in the six hundred and first year, in the first month, on the first of the month, the water was dried up from the earth. Then Noah removed the covering of the ark, and looked, and behold, the surface of the ground was dried up. And in the second month, on the twenty-seventh day of the month, the earth was dry.

"Then God spoke to Noah, saying, "Go out of the ark, you and your wife and your sons and your sons' wives with you"." (Genesis 8:6-16, NAS).

Noah saw that the water "was dried up from the earth" but he waited on God for almost two whole months until God said it was time to leave the ark. What if his impatience to get out of that ark had caused him to rush ahead of God's timing? One commentary I read said that the water may have receded, but the land was not yet dry enough to walk on. He and his family would surely have sunk into a muddy mess!

After the dove brought back the olive leaf and Noah realized the water had receded, he could have jumped at the chance to get himself and his family off that obviously stinky boat. But instead he waited until God told him it was time.

How often do we get tangled up in "what might have been" because we jump so far ahead of God's timing? My husband, Rick, and I found this out with our move to Arizona. We've been living here now for 5 years, but contemplated and prayed about this move for at least four years before it actually happened.

Every time we started to think seriously about the move, we felt very uneasy and indecisive. Should we move or should we stay? Those wavering thoughts always led us to the same conclusion: "No." As we kept praying about this over the next couple of years, we decided that instead of talking about it all the time, we would instead just keep praying about it. And if one of us felt God telling us that it was time to move, we would then let the other know.

So it was a wonderful surprise when both of us "suddenly" felt God telling us that it was time to move. Not only that, He revealed it to each of us at the same time! The main reason we were so surprised is that we had finally allowed ourselves to become involved in different ministries at our church, thinking that we would probably not be moving for quite a long time. After all, God had been telling us "No" about our move for so long -- at least that's what we thought.

In retrospect, we both realized that God wasn't saying "No" to us, but "Not yet." And while we were waiting, He wanted us to involve ourselves in ministry exactly where we were, whether He was going to move us soon or not.

"Bloom where you're planted" -- we've all heard that before. Rick and I had been so focused on not getting involved in ministry because we thought we were on the verge of moving that we failed to listen to God's prodding. We stayed too long at the "Don't Walk" light instead of stepping out in faith when God turned on the "Walk" light of ministry opportunities. You can believe we have never made that mistake again!

In Psalm 27:14, David is telling us how to wait upon the Lord. We are to "be strong." He certainly knew what he was talking about. He was anointed king when he was 16 years old but he did not actually become king until he was 30. Now that was a long wait!

Waiting on God is not easy, is it? It often seems as if He cannot hear us or that He is not answering us. If we don't get an answer right away, we may think we're praying about things in the wrong way or that perhaps God doesn't understand the urgency of our situation. Well, Beloved, God knows exactly what is going on here on earth and in our hearts. He knows what is needed and, in fact, He knew these things before we were even born! His timing is alwaysexactly right! Remember, "...with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day" (1 Peter 2:8,).