Still Waiting? Learning to Trust God’s Timing

Here’s the thing about waiting. It’s what we tell ourselves while we wait that determines how we wait.

You can think, “this is gonna take forever!” and sigh hopelessly. Or, you can think, “I don’t know how long this will take, but I’m trusting God’s perfect timing. He will take care of me.”

Big diff.

God keeps perfect time. Do you believe it? Things will unfold in your life when He is ready, when circumstances are ready, or when we are ready.

Here are a few examples. You can’t tell a newborn baby to run a marathon and then be disappointed when he does not. It’s not time yet. He has to grow up first, and gain strength and muscle.

You can’t order a closed rosebud to “open up now!” It simply will not happen. In time the graceful flower unfolds.

“To everything there’s a time and an hour,
for our lives to unfold and for roses to flower.
There’s a reason and purpose for every delay,
and with patience and timing we’ll get there someday.”

That’s a line from a poem I wrote years ago called, “A Time for Everything.” So, as you wait, you can…

Prepare
Pray
Have patience
Choose joy
Trust God’s timing
Live in the “now”

Sometimes we need to “grow up on the inside” and that begins as we first “grow down,” much like the like the roots of a bamboo tree. For the first six years, the tree develops an extensive root system under the earth. If you stood there and looked at the site where the bamboo tree was planted you’d think nothing was happening.

Lots of waiting.

Then, finally, in the seventh year, the bamboo plant shoots up 80 feet tall! But if it had not first created such a widespread root system the tree would not have had the support needed for such explosive growth.

Although it seemed like nothing was happening, God was at work preparing for growth.

Things are not always what we see.

Waiting builds character, strengthens our dependence upon God and draws us closer to Him. It protects us from harm, and grows us up on the inside.

Waiting is for a reason. “God lets us wait—,” says Dan Allender, “not to punish us, not because he has forgotten us, but because our waiting is the crucible he uses to purify our hope for him.”

No matter what you wait upon, know upon Whom you wait. The Lord will deliver you.

As you wait, Believe.