When the Lord Asks You to Wait

As we continue in this Walking with Purpose series, it’s important to recognize that in any journey there are times of waiting. Times to pause, to rest, to listen, and to be sure of where we are going.

This is especially true in our walk with the Lord.

So often in the Kingdom of God, we are asked to do things that feel the opposite of what we would naturally choose. The last are first. A gentle answer turns away wrath. And here, too, we are called to move forward… and yet, to wait.

The Bible calls us to press forward toward the prize, but not in a striving or forcing way. It is as we keep our eyes fixed on Jesus that we move forward. And at times, He calls us to wait.

In the kingdom of God, this can feel upside down. But when we wait on the Lord, it is often the very way He moves us forward, and we may be gaining more ground than we realize.

To wait on the Lord is to have trust in Him. Psalm 37:7 says, “Rest in the Lord, and wait patiently for Him.” And earlier in the psalm we read, “Trust in the Lord and do good… Commit your way to the Lord; trust also in Him” (verses 3 and 5).

It is never an easy thing to “wait on the Lord” or to “trust in Him” when we want quick results.

When We Stop Waiting

When we look at the story of Moses and the Israelite people in Exodus 32, we see that Moses was up on the mountain where God was giving him the Ten Commandments. But the Israelites, who had seen many supernatural signs and wonders, still did not trust God enough to wait. Verse 8 says, “they have turned aside quickly.”

They took things into their own hands and produced an idol.

We see the same thing in Genesis 16, where Abraham took things into his own hands to produce the promised heir. The result was Ishmael, Hagar’s son.

The Bible is full of testimonies of people who were tired of waiting on God. So they did their own thing, but that never works for God’s glory.

How often do we take things into our own hands and do things our own way as we become impatient with waiting on God?

Perhaps we did not get that business breakthrough we expected. So while we have not forsaken God, our eyes have moved from the eternal purposes of God to the temporal. We are now focused on building our business our way.

Or consider the person who senses their time in a place is coming to an end, but instead of seeking the Lord step by step, moves ahead in their own timing and misses what God had prepared. Or those who have been holding onto something the Lord has promised, but as time passes, they grow tired of waiting and quietly lay it aside.

The day-to-day examples are endless.

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