I am not good at waiting. I tend to be a very impatient person. When I want something to happen, I want it to happen now. I want to know what’s going to happen. I don’t like having to wait for things or to find out how it’s all going to turn out. In fact I’m rather annoyed that I have to wait several weeks before this blog post gets posted as I’m scheduling it in advance and not publishing it right away!

I’ve said this before, but I like spoilers. Yes I look at the back of the book when I want to know what happens. I don’t like being caught off guard. I’m not really a good person to go see a suspense movie with because I can’t stand the suspense.

So knowing my personality and preferences, it’s really frustrating when God tells you as an answer to your prayer that he just wants you to wait. “Come on God, really? Do you realize how hard this is? Can’t you just tell me what’s going to happen?” Nope that’s not how God works. He’s not like a genie in a bottle that grants wishes. He’s not going to make things go faster just because we want them to happen now. There’s a reason why he wants us to wait. And it’s usually when we finally stop fighting him and allow him to take over that we begin to realize why.

I have found for me that the best times for me to do my quiet time with God is in the car during my commutes. It’s good because, thanks to the lovely Northern Virginia traffic, since I have to sit in traffic there aren’t usually a lot of distractions that take my focus away. And there have been times, when I get severely frustrated with the slowness of how things that God has promised me seem to be progressing. And I tend to yell at God and just tell him how angry I am at him and how I don’t understand why things are going this way and how I don’t believe that what he says is going to happen…basically everything from Trusting God When Things Seem Impossible.

I want to know what exactly am I waiting on (is it what I want or is it something that has yet to be revealed?) and exactly how long am I supposed to be waiting (days, weeks, months, years? Should I be actively waiting or push it aside and forget about it for now?).

And then because I’m hoarse from yelling, I turn on the radio to fill up the silence. And I swear this song comes on the radio EVERY SINGLE FREAKING TIME I started to argue with God about having to wait.

And I’ll kneel down,
Wait for now
I’ll kneel down,
Know my ground

Raise my hands
Paint my spirit gold
And bow my head
Keep my heart slow

‘Cause I will wait, I will wait for you
And I will wait, I will wait for you
And I will wait, I will wait for you
And I will wait, I will wait for you

-“I Will Wait” by Mumford and Sons

And yes I know that this song has been super popular and every station seems to be playing it, and also the song is quite ambiguous if it’s about waiting for the person you love or about God. But the fact that the song would come on right when I needed it makes me feel more like it’s a small and subtle reminder from God on what I need to do.

• “Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope: Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. I say to myself, “The Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.” The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him; it is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord.” (Lamentations 3:21-26)

I’m not going to wait for specific things to happen. I’m not going to put my energy, time, or any part of me sitting around waiting for that one day to come for things I want. I can’t waste my life away. Instead I will wait for God. I will wait with God. The difference is that I am giving him the control and not me trying to make something happen on my own. I will allow him to have things happen in his own time frame and not mine because I realize that it is not the right time yet. God’s laid on my heart what he wants me to do and he’s made me a promise of what is to come. Who am I to try and force his hand?

“Child,” [Aslan] replied, “that is why all the rest are now a horror to her. That is what happens to those who pluck and eat fruits at the wrong time and in the wrong way. The fruit is good, but they loathe it ever after…….For the fruit always works – it must work- but it does not work happily for any who pluck it at their own will.” – from THE MAGICIAN’S NEPHEW by C.S. Lewis

A good explanation of why even though you may want something NOW, it’s better to wait. No matter how it good it may be NOW, wait until it’s time and it will even better than you could possibly imagine.

There are two excellent articles from Relevant Magazine that I have found extremely helpful to me during this time period. The first is “Why Won’t God Hurry Up?”, a question I find myself asking all the time. The other “5 Reasons Why God Makes Us Wait” is kind of ironic for me.  The day that article was published, that morning I had literally just had another “Why God? Why am I waiting? Why am I doing this? Why do I have to wait?” conversation with God when I refreshed Relevant’s homepage and then BOOM! That article then appeared on my screen. It was kind of freaky and comforting all at the same time.

• “For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.” (Romans 8:24-25)