I’m pretty sure that one of the most frustrating things about life is waiting. You wait in traffic. You wait in the doctor’s office. You wait forever in Walmart. You even have to wait on the Lord.

Isaiah 64:4 From ancient times no one has heard, no one has listened to, no eye has seen any God except you who acts on behalf of the one who waits for him.

Waiting is the process of becoming what God wants us to be. What God does in us while we wait is as important to God as what He does for us.

Eric Spier gives 5 reasons that waiting on the Lord is a good thing:

WAITING REVEALS OUR TRUE MOTIVES

Waiting has a way of bringing out the best and worst in people. People who don’t have good motives won’t wait long because they’re not interested in the commitment it takes to see something through. They’re too interested in short-term gains or success. Most of us have good intentions, but a lot of what we want to accomplish is an attempt to make a name for ourselves or for our own egos. It hurts to say this, but it’s often true.

WAITING BUILDS PATIENCE IN OUR LIVES

Patience in waiting for small things leads to having patience in the bigger things. If we can’t wait for God to do a small thing, we certainly can’t wait for something bigger. Our problem is our perspective is usually wrong. We tend to think the bigger things in life are finances and possessions, while God thinks influencing and changing people is more important.

WAITING BUILDS ANTICIPATION

Why do children get so excited around Christmas? Because the wait has produced anticipation. We tend to appreciate things the longer we have to wait for them. People tend to treasure the things they have to wait for.

WAITING TRANSFORMS OUR CHARACTER

Waiting has a way of rubbing off the rough edges of our lives.

Most of us know the story of Moses delivering the Israelites from the Egyptians. It’s a grand story of God doing great miracles. But few sermons talk about Moses having to wait in the desert 40 years before God came to him. God used this time of waiting to transform his character. We know this because when he was a young man, he was brash and impatient. In his impetuousness he killed a man and hid the body. When his sin was made public, he ran for his life and was exiled to the desert. When he was given a second chance, he opted to do it God’s way and in God’s time. In the end, the Israelites were delivered from slavery and Moses became a great leader. Waiting transformed the life of Moses and it does the same for you and me.

WAITING BUILDS INTIMACY AND DEPENDENCY UPON GOD

The reason we are able to read about the great men and women of the Bible is because they all had one thing in common. They were all people who learned their success in life was directly proportionate to their intimacy and dependency upon God. Waiting during the difficult times developed their relationship with God. In the end, they learned to trust God in a deeper way and experienced the promises of God on a whole new level.

God is just as interested in the journey as he is the destination. If not, all the biblical accounts would only include the feel-good parts and not the good, the bad and the ugly of the times of waiting. We may not always understand why we have to wait, but the good news is that God never asks us to wait without Him.

The practice of waiting on God is training our hearts to desire God above everything. And then in that private space you listen with your mind and heart to whatever God wants to say to you. It may be an answer to your prayer request, or it may be that God wants to reveal more of Himself to you so that you can become more like Jesus. — Waiting is a discipline and one that is here to stay. Accept that and know that God is at work in your waiting.

  • To “wait for” the Lord is to live in faith—to live in the expectation that God’s “compassion doesn’t fail”—that his mercies never come to an end—that his faithfulness is not only great but assured.
  • To “wait for” the Lord is to live in the certainty that the Lord has the power and the will to bless those who are faithful.
  • To “wait for” the Lord is to see beyond one’s present circumstances to a future blessed by the hand of the Lord.

“That miserable, uncomfortable, painful silence in waiting is one of God’s most powerful tools to set us free.” – Jade Mazarin

So…learn to wait patiently on the Lord and watch him grow you as you grow in your understanding of the discipline of waiting.