PRAISE & PRAYER PROMPT ••• I don’t like waiting. I blame it on having a Christmas Day birthday. It sounds like a logical reason, right? After all, kids wait with eager anticipation for two specific dates each year: their birthday and Christmas. Mine just happens to be rolled into one so I wait a full year.
In fairness though, I’m sure if I had a June 25th birthday instead of a December 25th—I’d probably feel the same way about waiting. It’s just easier to label my impatience with what sounds like a pseudo-good reason.
But in reality, I know I’m not alone. Many share my disdain for waiting. It’s a pretty common thing.
Then there are those weirdos, I mean, people, who actually seem to enjoy waiting. My mother is one of them.
Those people have a healthy attitude about waiting—an attitude that actually enjoys the process of what waiting leads up to… the anticipation that makes me antsy—these people actually savor that anticipation and it makes their waiting a period of looking forward. I guess they ponder in the waiting? Maybe they fill their minds with “wondering?” I should ask my mother…
I guess in fairness to the wait-ers (as opposed to waiters), the anticipation must be fun when they are waiting for something good. I’m sure when they are waiting for something that may be bad, they feel the same stress and anxiety I tend to feel. They just always seem so calm. At least my mother does.
I’m trying to be patient in the areas of my life that require “waiting.” Lamentations 3:25 ESV says, “The Lord is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him.”
The irony hit me this morning. As I pleaded with God for only-He-knows-how-many-times… for the miracle I wait on… the prayer request I beg Him to answer… what I wait on minute after minute, hour after hour, day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year… He is asking me to wait.
For what? Only He knows.
And maybe that’s the lesson He’s trying to get through my head…
I know He has a purpose for everything. And I know that my deepest, most longed-for prayer request is within His will. I know that whatever we pray for in His will He’s promised to answer… and so I turn to Isaiah 55:9-10.
“For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven and do not return there but water the earth, making it bring forth and sprout, giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it” (ESV).
He’s promised that His Word will not return empty. So as I wait, I cling to the truth that He has a purpose, and His purpose is good.
Today, as you pray, thank God for His promises. Ask the Holy Spirit to help you pray even when you’re weary of waiting. Ask the Holy Spirit to equip you to wait, trusting in God’s plan and purpose.
