Waiting

All throughout the written Word we find psalmists, prophets, and ordinary Joes and Janes declaring that they will wait on God, wait on His salvation, on His help to come and rescue them. The Exodus is characterized by 400 freaking years of waiting, entire generations being born into, living through, and dying in slavery—with no word from God. We sang a song a couple Sundays ago in church that says, “Strength will rise as we wait upon the Lord.” This got me thinking and meditating on the concept of waiting, specifically as it relates to overcoming temptations. All of us get caught in moments of temptation. During these times we have two possible responses: 1) give in, or 2) cry out to God for help. Admittedly there are times I choose option one simply because it’s easier than fighting against it. I’ve come to realize something though about option two and, at first, it bothered me until I realized what God might be doing. Have you ever cried out for help, sometimes repeatedly, and after a short while simply given up and returned to option one? Did it feel like no help came, like God was on a smoke break, leaving you to flounder and fail? What if, on the other hand, help was coming, the Spirit revving up to come to our aid, to rescue us with a renewed strength? What if we just didn’t wait long enough? I think that in the waiting God is looking into our hearts, assessing, as it were, our commitment, our passion for holiness. God is asking, so it seems, “Do you really want to overcome? Are you willing to allow Me to wait, to grow you through the temptation? Will you hold on long enough for me to arrive? Or will you give up, never realizing I was preparing to knock on your door?” Like the song says, I think strength starts to rise, to gain strength in us, as we wait. Are we willing to wait for God to show up? Scripture time and again points to a God who shows up in the nick of time, when all hope seems lost, when we are grasping the very last strands of rope, as we wait for one more second (and one more and one more and one more…)

Will you and I wait?

shalom, matt