How Are You Waiting?

Wednesday, May 27, 2020
I believe that I shall look upon the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living!  Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the Lord!  Psalms 27:13-14

How Are You Waiting?
We all know that waiting is a part of life, and sometimes the season of waiting is unbearable and feels like forever.  Though we know better, it does at times feel like God could have forgotten us, or worse, we may feel unworthy of His rescue or that we deserve everything that is happening to us.

Suffering or waiting can be so long, but your deliverance may be very quick. But deliverance never comes without struggle, and some struggles are harder than others.  The waiting, the struggle, the trials, that is where the value is.  We see this lesson in lots of things like olives.  In the pressing the very precious olive oil comes out.  In pearls – pearls are formed when an irritant gets inside the shell of a mollusks.  They are formed as a defense mechanism due to the irritation. A struggle that produces a beautiful gem. Our struggles can produce beautiful things in our lives if we allow God to work and don’t fight the situation.  But because we are human, we do fight, and whine, and sometimes even waste away because of our struggles instead of looking to God and surrendering to Him to do the work in us while we wait.

Joseph waited thirteen years from the time he had the dream of his brothers and father bowing down to him until he was in the position of governor of the land, the person who sold grain to all its people.  Much of that time he was down in the pit – his brothers threw him in a pit and then sold him to gypsies.  He ended up in the dungeon in Egypt for most of his time there also.  You know he had to wonder where God was!  But all during that time God was still working in his life, and Joseph was working. He did not just go find a corner to sit in and sulk in the shadows.  He worked and proved himself responsible and trustworthy even in prison – and that was part of God’s plan while he was waiting.  God was getting him ready, just like He is getting you ready for something if you are in a season of waiting. Your waiting on the Lord is more for what you will be for others in Jesus name, more than it is for you to get what you want.

The only wat to get to the other side is through.  There is no way around and no shortcut – that will have a good outcome.  Trying to detour around what God has planned for us will never work out to our advantage.  The Israelites wondering in the wilderness are a perfect example for us. 

Christine Caine wrote:
The same can be said of the journey to our promised land. Despite our best efforts to find alternate routes, there’s only one way to get there — through. The Israelites experienced this. Their trek through the wilderness was only an 11-day journey. Yet it took them 40 years because they fought the process — grumbling, complaining, and resisting the work God wanted to do in them.

We all have some version of the wilderness to go through; it’s how God prepares us to be well able to overcome the giants in our lives. It’s never a place we go looking for. But it’s there He is leading, transforming, delivering, and freeing us because His goal for us is freedom—a life no longer bound by the weights of shame’s false guilt and relentless regret, a life no longer haunted by fears and worries.

As hard as it is sometimes to be obedient to God in our times of waiting and struggles, He will see us through if we trust Him and step faithfully.  He always makes a way through.  It may not be the path we would choose, but He is faithful always.  In our waiting He does not forsake us as it feels sometimes.  He is there with us and leading us all the way through.


 Lara Cook