Stuck in the Waiting Room

We all have spent a lot of time waiting since March 2020. Waiting for the end of lockdowns. Waiting for election results. Waiting for a COVID vaccine to be developed. Waiting to get a vaccine.

I still wait to hug my oldest grandson. I’m eager to get back to face-to-face teaching of my refugee students. I wait to enjoy the sound of a roomful of women speaking Arabic, Amharic and other tongues while drinking tea and savoring walnut-filled pastries.

And speaking of waiting, more than 79.5 million forcibly displaced people worldwide wait for stable homes, according the UN Refugee agency. The dire circumstances of so many burden me.

What do you wait for? What people inhabit your personal concerns? Wayward children, a sick friend?

Do you have significant personal desires that haven’t been realized?

There are moments, months or even years when we wait for change, justice, healing or resolution and then slog through the mud of dashed hopes, turmoil and disappointment. “Wait on the Lord” is one of the last things we want to hear at such times. But perhaps we need to re-examine what it means to wait.

Scriptures on waiting have stimulated my thinking. These are some of my discoveries mined from the Word:

• Whatever we wait for, we ultimately wait for the Day of the Lord when all is just and right (James 5:7-8).
• Waiting does not mean inaction.  It encompasses continuing on while refusing to resort to ungodly tactics to achieve God’s goals. David waited on God to ascend to the throne and refused to remove Saul from power by killing him by his own hand, or by the hands of his men (1Sam. 24:6; 26:9-11).
• Instead of inaction, waiting often entails suffering, hard work, service with hope, persistence with love in the face of discouragement. (Gal. 6:9) Waiting leaves timing and results in God’s hands. One Christian worker served for many years before seeing fruit, but when fruit came, it increased rapidly.
• God renews the strength of those who wait with hope (Isaiah 40:28-31). We base our hope in waiting on God’s character, strength, power and justice, not our own. We will never be disappointed because God will prevail (Psalm 13:5-6; Isaiah 40:18; 64:4).

Think again about the things you wait for. Renew your commitment to pray, live, and serve faithfully while leaving the results and timing in God’s hands.

The original version of this blog appeared on this site on August 7, 2018.

Photo credit: “Waiting” by marco.giumelli is licensed under CC BY 2.0