Waiting and God’s Promises
Good Morning,
Perhaps you have heard the little saying: “God is never late, but seldom early.” Oh, how we wish God would operate on our schedule rather than His. Scripture teaches us to wait patiently on God. There are dozens of verses that refer to waiting and many promises related to it. A couple of the most familiar are:
Ps. 27:14 Wait on the Lord; Be of good courage, And He shall strengthen your heart; Wait, I say, on the Lord!
Is. 40:31 But those who wait upon the LORD will renew their strength; they will mount up with wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not faint.
The thing that ultimately makes these and other promises so wonderful is that they are utterly dependent on God, not us. It is the character and integrity of God that make such promises worth standing on. He alone is capable of sustaining us in the waiting and bringing about His purposes as a result.
As we have learned, we cannot on our own bring those purposes about. If we could, glory would be inappropriately focused on us not Him. S. Michael Durham writes:
At its heart, waiting on God is an unshakable conviction that we are not sufficient in our limited capacities to glorify God. If you’re going to wait on God as He has instructed you, until He brings His Word and promises to pass, you need an unshakable resolve that you are not able to bring those promises to pass. You cannot in and of yourself do it. You need the resolve to realize you are not sufficient to do what God has told you to do.1.
One of keys then to waiting, is focusing not just on the promises of God, but on the maker and keeper of those promises. God Himself. We so often want solutions to our difficulties. We want an end to our waiting and so we look for ways out of it. But it may well be that what God most wants us to find is not a solution at all. Rather, He wants us to find Him. It is God that is adequate in all circumstances. When we focus on Him, we find whatever we need in the moment today and in the moments that will present themselves in the days ahead.
The waiting room is a sacred place to connect with the Creator and Sustainer of all things. To get up close to the One who walks with you in the waiting and knows precisely how long you need to be in that space. It is never wasted, never random or left to chance. It is secured and ordained by the Almighty Himself.
Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and your dominion endures through all generations. The LORD is trustworthy in all he promises and faithful in all he does. Ps. 145:13
Questions to ponder this week:
1. Are you focusing on the Promise Keeper, not just the promises?
2. What does getting up close to God look like for you?
Live on purpose, Ron Klopfenstein, CPLC
1. Real Truth Matters, S. Michael Durham, June 23, 2013