How Well Do You Wait?

They met in 1930 at a Halloween masquerade ball. He was 20 years old and had already been working for the local utility company for four years. She was a 16-year-old high school student, living in a dormitory many miles from her family’s farm. They fell in love and decided to marry after her high school graduation. Then came the waiting …

He felt he could not marry her until he had a home they could call their own, and it would need to be attractively furnished too. This set into motion a three year waiting period while he built a small two-story home and began to purchase furniture. They were finally married in late fall, 1934. The local newspaper told the story of a beautiful bride in a floor length silk dress carrying a bouquet of baby’s breath and roses. The article gave the couple’s new address where friends could call on them and see their beautiful little home. The waiting had been worth every minute!

Waiting for something you desire is never enjoyable, and in today’s world  it can really test one’s character. But life has not always been so “instant,” and the Bible never tells us that what is worthwhile in life will come quickly to us. In fact, waiting tends to bring out unpleasant emotions in us: anger, frustration, ungratefulness, even jealousy.

Perhaps those negative emotions are one reason God often keeps us waiting for what we desire. He wants to work those feelings out of us and help us grow spiritually. When we allow Him to do this through the waiting, we find in the end that we are closer to Him, we receive joy from the journey, and we may even decide that what we thought we couldn’t live without is not what we wanted at all!

Waiting is a part of life, it is as real for each of us as breathing and growing. How we wait for things is where we make the choice. And God desires to help us when we struggle with waiting:

But as for me, I will look expectantly for the Lord and with confidence in Him I will keep watch; I will wait [with confident expectation] for the God of my salvation. My God will hear me.  Micah 7:7

The author in Micah, chapter 7, believed that God would hear his prayers. He chose to put his confidence in God while he waited. He did not plead with God to take the waiting period away, though he may have been tempted to do that very thing! Just like the young couple who married decades ago after waiting for the completion of the appropriate time, we will also wait … but will we wait well?

What are you waiting for today? How can you put your confidence in God and wait in joy for Him to fulfill your desire?