I wait for the Lord; my soul waits, and in his word I hope; my soul waits for the Lord more than those who watch for the morning, more than those who watch for the morning.
- Psalm 130:5-6
Yesterday I had the privilege of joining my son’s 1st grade class on a field trip to Dallas’ Old City Park, my first time chaperoning a trip like that. As a parent volunteer, I did a number of things on the field trip. I helped guide kids from station to station at the park. I walked children to the restroom. I helped pass out lunches.
But more than anything else, I did a lot of waiting. Waiting in my car for the school buses to arrive at the park. Waiting outside the buses for the kids to file off class by class. Waiting for park personnel to give us our instructions. And after lunch, waiting for the bus drivers to give the signal that it was time to return to school. As best I can determine, roughly 60% of chaperoning an elementary school field trip is waiting.
In that respect, it’s not a bad training ground for life, where key moments of action are bookended by long periods of boredom, stillness, and delay. Whether you’re in traffic or at the doctor’s office, whether you’re impatiently refreshing your email inbox or checking the oven timer for the 10th time, everyone knows the impatience of wanting the next thing, the anticipated thing, to happen now.
This is true in the life of faith too. When you pray, you are telling God what you want, confiding your hopes and trusting him to be faithful. But when you say amen, you then have to wait on his will and his timing—rather than trying to force the issue, you simply act in obedience and have faith in God.
As much as we long for the finality of answered prayers
and advancing to new things, it is in the waiting that spiritual growth happens,
because waiting demands faith. So whatever you’re waiting for right now,
however impatient you may feel, draw close to the Lord—and watch him change you
while you wait.
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