Wait and hope for and expect the Lord; be brave and of good courage and let your heart be stout and enduring. Yes, wait for and hope for and expect the Lord.
Psalm 27:14 AMP
Ever since listening to “The Two are One,” I’ve been mulling and chewing and asking about what it is to wait for the Lord. I absolutely can’t get over just how active waiting is, how full of anticipation and wonder it is! And I see more clearly than ever just where I drop the ball when it comes to waiting on God.
Short answer? I think that I know how God thinks and what He will do to fulfill His Word and His promises. I really think that I have a good bead on the mind of the Most High, even when He’s given me no particulars. I simply cannot tell you how many times the Holy Spirit brings me the following correction: “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts” (Is. 55:9). It’s happened so often that I don’t even have the energy to be embarrassed any more!
For all of God’s promises have been fulfilled in Christ with a resounding “Yes!”
2 Corinthians 1:20a NLT
God is not a man, that He should lie…
Numbers 23:19a KJV
God doesn’t lie, so if He says that all of His promises are fulfilled in Christ, then that’s the truth. I believe this. This is the truth and I cling to it. Where I get in trouble is when I go beyond that and begin to speculate on all the ways in which the promise could be fulfilled. And then I keep those ways in mind and cast around looking for the confirmation to my speculations, as if they’re the only options for God. There isn’t a word with enough punch to contain such unapologetically ignorant arrogance. There’s a very good reason that the Holy Spirit brings me certain scriptures again and again and again!
Considering how very little I understand about the complexities of our universe, you’d think I’d be comfortable with the idea that the Mind of its Creator is likewise beyond my ken. Well, you’d be wrong! The primary death for me when I wait on the Lord is the reality that I don’t know what, when, who or how He’s going to do what He says He’ll do. And unless He tells me, I cannot know. I know only that He WILL do what He promised. I know what He promises and I KNOW that He’s coming. And when I finally let go of my illusions of knowledge and control, I can receive the divine anticipation and wonder at His what and when and who and how.
I never knew that waiting could be peaceful, and I certainly didn’t think it could be such a lively thing. It is a sometimes-electric anticipation of the utterly unknown, like running toward the horizon and watching it expand ever outward as the very world you inhabit broadens further than your imagination. I am waiting for the outlandish gifts of the Father, and I’m being brought to the bliss that only comes in accepting the reality of my ignorance.
Waiting on the Lord isn’t always a death experience. Love is patient. Waiting is character development. Also waiting encourages me to spend time loving God, looking at who He is, and listening to His voice. I think waiting is wonderful. God always shows up when I am loving Him!
Thank you Jennifer for sharing your heart in this journey! How important this message is. As I’m reading this, was reminded of Sarah in the OT. She thought she had an idea, of how God would bring about His promise into fulfillment, and she even took one further step and acted upon that. And we know the mess and the implications of that story. And even though we have all these examples from His Word, unfortunately many times we do fail too. For Abraham and Sarah, The Lord did not bring the promise to fulfillment until there was zero percent… Read more »
Yes thank you. It is a real dying and trusting. It has to be dead. It is difficult to know how to die to a promise and still believe that God is faithful to bring what is promised. It is a trusting in His complete Sovereignty and not in my own effort or understanding. It is a fire that exposes and burns everything.
This topic brings to mind some lyrics in Vicky Yohe’s “In the Waiting”:
“Time to let it go and just believe
Trusting in what no one else can see, but then again,
The silence doesn’t mean that I’m alone
As long as I can hear that I am still Your own . . .
I want to feel Your arms as they surround me
And let me know that it’s OK
To be here in this place
Resting in the peace that always comes
In the waiting.”
Love
Thanks for sharing these lyrics. I need His grace to wait in peace.
Concerning Joseph, “Until the time that his word came to pass,
The word of the Lord tested him.” Ps. 105:19
Father strengthen us all that we may abide in You as we count you faithful to complete Your Word as You promised. You do everything You say You will do. We simply trust and wait to see Your glory.
Restore.
Thanks Jennifer,
Running towards an ever expanding horizon is such a perfect analogy, for me anyway!!!
Jim
Waiting on God, is one of the biggest shortcomings of man, we must get the I out of His way.
Very good word, Thanks Jen
God Bless,
Lee
Sweet Jen,
I have visions of you standing in the back seat of a yellow convertible! Hair wild in the wind, arms waving beside and up over your head, smiling from ear to ear, not a thought of care in the world…just JOY – Blissful, Radient, JOY!
Such is the life of a little child…and DADDY – KING is at the wheel!
I can t stop smiling!
Love!
“I never knew that waiting could be peaceful, and I certainly didn’t think it could be such a lively thing.”
What a wonderful experience, Jen!