Waiting

September 1, 2022

From Pastor Joe Wamack

“I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in his word I put my hope.”(Psalm 130:5).

There’s a whole lot of waiting going on!. There’s been lots of waiting, and wishing and hoping, and thinking and praying in this world. This psalm was written thousands of years ago. I thought waiting was kind of a recent 21st century phenomenon-but I guess not.

Everybody knows about waiting-it is part of our daily life. Children are familiar with it as are older people. Men experience it just like women, singles, married couples, divorced, and widowers as well. You deal with it when you are healthy or sick. It does not matter where you live on this globe or what color your skin is. It is a human condition. “Hurry up and wait” some people say.

We all wait for something. We hope and dream-and wait. We are hungry and thirsty-and wait. We yearn for change and look for happiness-and wait. We experience suffering and are in pain-and wait for relief. We study and work-and wait for the results. Some things we hope for are delayed-and keep us waiting. We pray-and wait for answers. We wait in line at Publix and the gas station. We wait in traffic and airports. We wait for the mail. We wait for good things to come and bad things to go. Some wait to fall asleep, and some even wait to die. We all wait because God's grace has not yet ended.

It seems as if our entire life, from birth to death, is characterized by waiting. Some waiting appears short, and time passes quickly. For other things we wait our whole life. Waiting makes us aware that often the most important, most essential, most beautiful, and most lasting things in our life are things beyond our control and power. And so we have to wait.

And hope-through it all.

Interestingly, the word translated “wait” in this psalm also means to hope and expect. We wait in anticipation, in hope that the thing we want will come to fruition. Trusting in God is to live like everyone-in a world of good and bad, highs and lows, and yet to keep vitally connected to God-to wait and trust and expect that He will answer.

Just because we wait, does not mean that God has forgotten us. God waits also-on us to come to know Him. God is patient-waiting on us to realize we can only do so much as humans and to turn to Him for Divine Assistance. We wait-but as Isaiah 40:30-31 says,

“They who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.”

Waiting is a part of Life-Trusting God is our privilege during the waiting.