When I am trying to patiently wait upon The Lord to give me my next assignment, I have to be intentional to guard myself against the thought that I am not doing anything worthy. As demonstrated in the story of Mary and Martha, sitting at the feet of Jesus and listening is as much an active and necessary aspect of Kingdom work as anything else. Waiting and listening feel incongruent to my flesh, but they are invaluable to my Father.
Tag: waiting
Temporarily Stalled Stories
Seemingly open doors that fold on seasons of prayer are difficult. Sometimes it feels like we are marching to the beat of a stagnant song forever in waiting.
I am so grateful to be at a place in my life where I can confidently rejoice in the folding of opportunities because I know that each canceled plan is leading me closer to the perfect time and place engraved in the palm of my Savior’s hand.
What are you waiting for today, friend? Pauses hold great purpose in The Painter’s picture.
Futility and faith do not dance in The Teacher’s plan.
Hold on to the hope that you are being honed for a time that is perfect and predestined by a Soverign God who wants your temporarily stalled story to be used for His glory.
The Splendor of Struggle
Dear friend, whatever struggle is dominating your thoughts today is the very one that will swaddle you in strength. It will clothe you with compassion, and it will honor you with humility. Every painful circumstance becomes a purposeful square in the quilt you are sowing. Embrace the opportunity in your obstacles. Remember, when you are afraid you are available. When you are confused, you are connected. When you are waiting, you are watchful. When desperate you are dependent, and when lonely you are looking. In Jesus’s economy, weakness is the source from which all good and beautiful things grow. May grace fill every season of growth and spring streams of joy along your journeys.
Are You Waiting?
Are you waiting?
I am a fairly patient person but when it comes to waiting on matters close to my heart, I am a work in progress. Waiting for answers to my desperate prayers, especially the ones I have been praying for a long time challenges my patience and tests my faith every day. (Psalm 119:81)
I am learning to train myself to remember that my wait is God’s welcome. It is His invitation for me to grasp a deeper dependence on Him, strengthen my trust in His plan, not mine, and to spend more time in His presence. Also, I have come to realize that when I am waiting, He is working in me the most. He is pruning me and perfecting His plans for me.
God answers some prayers immediately. Some take us through many intervals of being on hold. I think in one way or another we are all in a season of waiting. I am practicing being grateful in my wait because I believe God’s word. (Lamentations 3:25)
I know that His timing is perfect even when it looks imperfect to me. I am practicing praising Him in my waiting because I am certain it is a conduit He uses to work all things for my good. (Romans 8:28.)
Sometimes my wait ends in an outcome that my earthly eyes view as unfavorable, but God has eternal eyes, and I trust His superior vision above my self-centered sight. (Proverbs 3:5-6)
If you are in a time of waiting, do not let it be wasted. Practice prayer. Practice trusting that God is perfecting His plan for you. Lastly, practice praising Him for the good things He is doing for you that no man can immediately see or imagine. It will transform the weariness of your wait, and give greater purpose to your grueling pause. (Psalm 33:20-22)
Keep fighting the good fight, friends!
The Wait Marches On
Just as the birth of new life is a process, so are growing into an adolescent, adult and so on. Everything is a process. A process of success, a process of failure, a process of destruction and a process of restoration. Then you get to the end of years, seasons and cycles, and you sit at deaths door with someone you love as you watch the curtain drawing on the last act of their rehearsal for eternal life. You ache in the finality of what is and you abide in the memory of what was. As you sit and wait, you pray for swift mercy. You don’t want to keep staring at the mask of eminent death settled on the face of a loved one. Questioning sets in, and then you remember, just as you didn’t know how the process would begin, you also cannot know how and when it will end. The moment we took our first breath, and the moment we draw our last were determined in advance. They were written by eternal hands that no human mind could know. Although a delayed ending of the final process feels unjust, you remember we have earthly eyes, ears and minds. We cannot see, hear or know. Trying to figure it out, or ask when is stepping out of our realm and into God’s. Sometimes His timing seems unjust but faith continues to whisper, it is always right! Then, the wait marches on.
Please pray for Nana to be with Jesus soon. Everything indigenous to her is gone, but her heart is still beating strong. Your will not ours Lord.
Good Company
If you are suffering today, remember the lives of Jesus, Naomi, Job… If you have been waiting a long time for something, remember Abraham, Sarah, Moses…You are never alone in your pause or your pain. We can not always choose our position, but absolutely our perspective! Be of good courage friends, and never loose hope.
Turn Your Wait Into A Welcome
If you are waiting for something today; a job, test results, a cure, relief from circumstances… There is an abiding gift available to all those who are anxiously scanning the horizon with expectation. Turn your waiting into a welcome to saturate deeper into the affection of a Savior, who longs to give rest to the weary. He is not ashamed by your frustrated impatience. It is the very thing that draws Him to you. Don’t wait alone. I wait for the LORD; my whole being waits, and in his word I put my hope. ~Psalm 130:5