By Not Known
It is one of most annoying thing for many. When we live in a fast-paced world with great anxiety to grab at every opportunity to succeed, waiting can be the least sought-after virtue. For when someone on the escalator is blocking the rightmost path; or when every email or text message has an answer-me-now tag; or when the traffic lights take a little longer to change, we become agitated. For those watching the stock market, the running information of stock prices going at all directions can literally drive up the blood pressure. Waiting can be hazardous to health.
It is therefore not wise to wait as every moment can turn into wasted time or missed opportunities.
However, while it may be good stewardship to seize opportunities (Col 4:5), it may also be good discipline to learn how to wait on the Lord.
When Paul was put in prison, it was wasted time. So it seemed. All he could do was wait for his release, if it ever was granted him at all. He could have just languished there and let his life be simply wasted away. But no, his special moments with God was at God’s own timing and disposal, he made the best use of his time.
Paul’s understanding of time can help us in waiting on God. God’s time is not just measured by seconds, minutes, hours and days, etc. It is seen as the right moment when God’s work is accomplished. We have been taught early on from Scriptures about waiting on God and waiting for the Lord (Psalm 27:14). We have been instructed to be encouraged for it is never waiting in vain. For God is a faithful God who keeps His promise. Whatever He has said so, will eventually come to pass. The only characteristic of such waiting is that it is not measured by the way we look at time although what we are waiting for will come to pass eventually.
As far as God is concern, all waiting is connected to hope (Rom. 8:24). While we are exhorted to wait, we place our hope in the Lord. To do so is to live godly and upright lives which is what waiting in hope means.
Paul in Galatians tell us that in the goodness of time, God sends His Son. Now that is speaking on our terms, our understanding of time. Even so, it is the most opportune of time, as the waiting for the coming of Jesus Christ did take place in time and space. Our hope in salvation happens when that took place. When the people of God waits patiently and obediently for that to happen, they are rewarded.
Hence, the discipline of waiting is not just connected to physical events that is to happen but to wait on the God who makes those events happen.
So, we do not become impatient while we wait but rather we learn to be absorbed into God’s presence, God’s being and God’s realm. In this, when we gather for worship, when we take the time to communicate with God in our quiet time and prayers, we are waiting on God’s holy presence and enter into God’s realm. When Paul exhorts us to worship Him and present ourselves to Him as living sacrifices, we are doing so similarly to be in God’s presence. When we obey Him and do whatever we are engaged in through life, speech and deeds, we are actually waiting on God in worship. Are you waiting on the Lord?
Peter Poon