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We hear and make reference to how each of us is unique even though there can be many things that are similar. There are roles and callings that look alike but how we each walk them out is not the same based on a long list of variables. But one calling is true for us all. We are all called to wait and waiting is not something we enjoy whether we are waiting on a blessing or waiting for something we dread. Nevertheless it is our lot in life. 

We tend to want things now. Little wonder there can be so many grumblings when we are forced to wait. 

We see it in infants and toddlers over and over again. We might think we grow out of those urgent pleas or demands but we see it in adults caught up in road rage. We see it in pushing and shoving trying to enter concerts or sports arenas. We see it in pacing in hospital waiting rooms and on military bases around the world when we expect the return of a loved one.

Sometimes we see it when fists are raised in the air angrily berating a group or individual we do not agree with or even at God. We see it when people give up and walk away and harden their hearts to hope because life has been disappointing. We react with vengeance when we are not in control of so many things we want or that matter to us.

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One of the challenges we see story after story in the Bible is how often waiting was required and many could not and tried taking matters into their own hands to get what they wanted. It didn’t work out very well for them when that choice was made. Sarah couldn’t conceive so gave her slave to her husband to birth a child. It seemed like a good idea to her at the time. Hagar had no choice. But when she bore Ishmael, Sarah became jealous and threw her and the child out of her household and blamed her husband. She couldn’t wait on God’s promise of a child when she was so old. 

Israel wanted a king like all the surrounding nations and God gave them Saul to whom He gave instructions of how to lead. But Saul wanted things his own way and when the prophet Samuel was late he took the sacrifice and offered it up and it brought about his removal as king. Even King David had difficulty with waiting and would have killed Nabal for not giving food for him and his men had it not been for Abigail he would have done just that.

God has given us a plan for living this life but we tend to ultimately grow weary of waiting. Even so, we have all been called into lives between the “now” and “not yet.” 

Israel waited on a Messiah and when He came and didn’t meet their expectation many would not accept Him. Believers have been given the gift of grace if we accept Him despite our failures and sin and we wait on his return as king this time. What are we doing in the waiting? 

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“Already this world has been broken by sin, but not yet has it been made new again. Already Jesus has come, but not yet has he returned to take us home with him forever. Already your sin has been forgiven, but not yet have you been fully delivered from it. Already Jesus reigns, but not yet has his final kingdom come. Already sin has been defeated, but not yet has it completely been destroyed. Already the Holy Spirit has been given, but not yet have you perfectly formed into the likeness of Jesus. Already God has given you his Word, but not yet has it totally transformed your life. Already you have been given grace, but not yet has that grace finished its work. You see, we’re all called to wait because we all live right smack dab in the middle of God’s grand redemptive story. We all wait for the final end of the work God has begun in and for us.” 

Paul Tripp

As the world darkens and sickness and disease threaten, when storms of every kind wreak havoc on things and people we love, and wars and nations unravel in their godlessness, will we give up and let the light within us burn out? We have a choice every moment in how we respond to the call to wait. Our response speaks volumes to those with whom we are in contact and also to God. 

“Waiting on God is an action based on confident assurance of grace to come.” 

Paul Tripp

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The opening lines of a story are often ones we hold in our memories always. We recall “once upon a time” from our first introduction to stories in our childhood. Those lines opened the door to magical tales of adventure that we often heard while sitting on the laps of someone dear to us just before bedtime. Many of us have warm feelings recalling those special times but sadly some of us never knew such times and were robbed of all it meant to enjoy a good story or a thirst to read so we could read our own books and stories one day.

Of course the greatest story of them didn’t begin with those words. That story began with “in the beginning.” From cover to cover the authors wrote the most powerful stories penned through the inspiration of God that have ever been written and they have lasted for hundreds of years, far surpassing beloved tales by Dr. Seuss, Beatrix Potter, the Uncle Arthur series of books and so many more.

Whether we are avid readers or not, most of us are fascinated by a good story as it unfolds page by page or scene by scene on the screen. We are also curious about our own when you see the popularity of sites like Ancestry helping us look backward in time about what, where, when, and who are in our story.

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In the hurried pace of life however, we take less time to reflect on the greater story each of us is a part of that began with “in the beginning,” the God story of creation of all things and mankind. We don’t spend a great deal of time considering how that story is still ongoing and we are characters in it. Each day we add to our story. Some of it is purposeful but much more of it is random as life comes at us upending what we so often planned or hoped to do.

We replay favorite stories when we become parents and tell and read them to our children for their enjoyment and knowledge in palatable bites to offer insight and guidance for living. And no matter how old our children are, they remain tucked into our hearts and covered by prayers for all the things that can tempt them or seek to undo them in this life. 

It can be easy to forget we have been born into a dangerous world, one that is broken in obvious and not so easily seen ways, far from the original design God intended. We see big news stories that remind us that evil still exists but can miss the way it shadows our steps looking for ways to discourage us, create doubt there is anything but the power of evil in the world. There are subtle ways deceit creeps into much of what we hear or see including what whispers in our minds when our guard is down.

We see that played out in the masterful stories of C.S. Lewis in his Narnia stories and those of J.R.R. Tolkien in his three-part Lord of the Rings series. They remind us of truths we must not forget.

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Maybe some of this comes because we rarely hear of the word sin any more or how vulnerable we can be to it in small and big ways since the “in the beginning” story began and the antagonist, Lucifer (serpent of old) sought to usurp God’s glory and power for himself. Even if we are walking a path of redemption and seeking to live a grace-filled life, we still stumble and falter as we are not yet totally free of the DNA that became a part of us from those first parents (Adam and Eve). 

The antagonist of that overarching story desires us to reject God’s story and Christ’s path of redemption or at the least to question and doubt its power and truth. He would want us to not see God as our perfect father who loves us  like no other despite our messy lives and unwise choices. If we better understood his heart of love, mercy, and grace, we would be quick to run to Him when we fail and find ourselves entangled.

But there is hope and truth we must etch in our minds as clearly as those “once upon a time” stories of childhood. The true story of a perfect sacrifice and an empty tomb.

“God knows that we all are a lot like my children. We, too, minimize the fallenness of our world and the power of remaining sin, and when we do, we do not guard ourselves from temptation as we should. Isn’t it good to know that God in grace has placed his Warrior Spirit inside of us? He battles on our behalf even in those moments when we don’t have the sense to battle for ourselves.  Isn’t it good to know that while we still live in a broken world and still have sin inside of us, God constantly battles on our behalf? Now, that’s grace.” 

Paul Tripp in New Morning Mercies

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This might sound like a strange question to ask but consider this: whatever we are full of will be what leaks from the deepest recesses of our being whether we intend that or not.

One obvious way we see this is when we are overly tired or stressed. No matter what our faith or desire may be to emulate, most of us will leak lots of evidence of that exhaustion. Our words will be sharper, and our tone will often reflect frustration. We will listen less well even if we don’t want that to happen. We will be eager to get away from everyone and everything to find some level of relief even if that simply means falling into bed.

It happens to all of us.

But there are other things that seep out of us that may be harder to recognize unless we determine to observe ourselves objectively. If we are full of bitterness, envy, jealousy, lust, selfishness, greed, anger, or resentment, those will leak in our responses to life and those in it. We may very well try to hide such things in the recesses of our hearts, but we are never as skilled as we think in doing so.

Those less nice things, those sins, that we have left unattended within our hearts lead to a feeling of emptiness and we go to great lengths to try to fill that emptiness. We may use any number of things including but not limited to alcohol, cigarettes, food, spending (also known as retail therapy), sleeping, TV, movies, music, gambling, or even excessive exercise. We want to evade and avoid what seems to be devouring us. But we won’t stop there.

We also will try to use others to try to fill us up. Ruth Haley Barton puts it this way:

“When we are not finding ourselves loved by God in solitude, in the company of others we are always on the prowl for ways they can fill our emptiness. We enter life in community trying to grab and grasp from others what only God can give.”

Ruth Haley Barton in Invitation to Solitude and Silence

What we most need is for those persons we seek out to lovingly point us to the only Source that can deal with both the ugly things in our unattended heart and the emptiness that comes when our hearts have chilled from bitterness, disappointment, hurt, rejection, and more.

“At times the strength of spiritual community lies in the love of people who refrain from getting caught in the trap of trying to fix everything for us, who pray for us and allow us the pain of our wilderness, our wants, so that we may be more deeply grounded in God.”

Rosemary Dougherty

Those people will need a tenacious grace-filled faith to both nudge us and leave us alone with God even when we protest that we don’t hear Him, or He doesn’t care.

“Solitude, at its most basic and profound level, is simply an opportunity to be ourselves with God.”

Ruth Haley Barton in Invitation to Solitude and Silence

The simple truth is this: when we sit in the presence of the Lord, we are changed. His love overshadows us and washes away the debris within and floods us with Himself. It is then when we have been drenched like dew on grass in the early morning that we are satisfied. And when we leave that place to re-enter our world, we leak His love, His fragrance.

Paul writes in 2 Corinthians:

“For we are the sweet fragrance of Christ [which ascends] to God, [discernible both] among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing;”

2 Corinthians 2:15 (AMP)

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