Waiting

I have been challenged with this devotion this week, so much so that I have gone back and read it every day.  I've spent the last couple of weeks not really hearing the voice of God or being aware of His presence, or maybe hearing something, but then going back to feeling spiritually "dry" within minutes afterwards.  His Word hasn't been coming alive for me lately, as I'm so used to it doing.  I've felt like I was waiting.  Waiting on Him to show up.  Waiting on Him to reveal Himself to me.  Waiting on Him to do something profound.  And I was too caught up in my discontent with waiting, that I've been missing what He wants to do in me during this time.  I was so focused on getting out of this season that I neglected to consider the fruit that was ripening during this season.

This particular passage from the devotion stood out to me...

"We easily grow impatient of God’s delays. Much of our trouble in life comes out of our restless, sometimes reckless, haste. We cannot wait for the fruit to ripen, but insist on plucking it while it is green. We cannot wait for the answers to our prayers, although the things we ask for may require long years in their preparation for us. We are exhorted to walk with God; but ofttimes God walks very slowly. But there is another phase of the lesson. God often waits for us.

We fail many times to receive the blessing He has ready for us, because we do not go forward with Him. While we miss much good through not waiting for God, we also miss much through over-waiting. There are times when our strength is to sit still, but there are also times when we are to go forward with a firm step.

There are many Divine promises which are conditioned upon the beginning of some action on our part. When we begin to obey, God will begin to bless us."

The Lord has been telling me this week that the last couple weeks have been a quiet time of waiting for me.  A friend sent me a reference to Exodus 24, and how it has stood out to her how Moses had to wait on the mountain for 6 days for God to show up... 6 days!  What I see from that is how faithful Moses was.  As I was reading Hebrews 11 this week, that stood out to me for all the other "giants of the faith" listed in that chapter.  That Abraham, Noah, and more all had to patiently wait in faith for God to do the thing that he had promised, had told them about. 

My prayer is that I would have the faith of Abraham, of Moses, of Noah.  That I would believe things that don't make sense to me.  That I would have confidence in the voice of the Lord and hold fast to His word, to his truth, to his promises.  That I would be patient in the waiting, allowing Him to fully develop His work in and through me, and that I wouldn't over-wait, but would step forward in confidence at His first prompting. 

A few other devotions (from Streams in the Desert) have stood out to me in this area also.  Especially this one, talking about how there is no music during a rest, but the rest is part of the music.  And this one about trusting God whether or not we are seeing visible evidence that He is remembering us, and that when we trust Him without that evidence we will appreciate it even more once he sends us that visible evidence again.

Praying that I would be faithful in times of waiting.  That through that He would strengthen my trust and dependence upon Him.