Waiting on the Lord is hard, but it means putting his desires before your own and believing that he will meet your needs in his good time. Before any decision, pray and quiet yourself in God’s presence and seek his mind and heart.
I am still learning how to wait on the Lord.
Hi, I’m Joni Eareckson Tada, and I think I will always be learning how to wait on the Lord. I mean, I read Psalm 27 where it says, “Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord.” Okay, so, right there, waiting on the Lord is hard, right? It has to tell us to be strong. Take heart. Don’t allow yourself to grow weary over time. And believe me, I have been there. When I was first injured, I waited for the doctor’s diagnosis. Then, I waited for months in bed. I waited to sit up in a wheelchair. And after a year of waiting, I finally got out of rehab. Then, there was that long season in which I waited for God’s plan to be revealed in my paralysis. Back then, I needed to be strong. I had to learn to take heart, and not be anxious.
Waiting on the Lord means putting his desires before our own, believing that God will meet our needs with generosity and love, but in his good time. And that’s the difficult part. You may be strongly tempted to do something on the spur of the moment, like, you know, an important decision, or a desire that you want gratified, a choice that you don’t feel like putting off, or something that you just want now. Honestly, that’s I felt when I was learning how to live with my paralysis. I wanted things to feel better now. And you can relate, even if you’re not in a wheelchair, like those times when your itchiness to get things your way has you ready to settle for something of lower quality or less value. It could be a special purchase, or a choice in jobs, or a relationship. It could be a crossroads in your ministry. And the truth is, you really don’t want to wait. You don’t want to check in with the Lord, discern his mind and his desires, and wait, wait, wait for his green light.
Ah, but while we may regret a hasty decision a million times over, we will never regret waiting on the Lord. You can never go wrong as you pray and quiet yourself in his presence, seeking God’s mind and heart, because he’ll end up giving you something so much better. He’ll give you wisdom, and the really great thing about waiting on him is that God will give you himself. And oh, oh, oh, oh, I just love that; I’ve experienced that on nights when I cannot get to sleep due to pain, and I’m tempted to be anxious or think, “I’ve got to get some sleep; I won’t make it through the day tomorrow.” No, no, no. Being paralyzed, I have no choice but to wait. “Come on, Joni, just take a deep breath and wait on the Lord through the watches of the night.” And when I relax and let go and don’t hurry, but wait for him in the night, I apprehend the Lord in new, fresh ways. And sometimes I even fall asleep! And then, in the morning, all becomes clear. Whatever choices were facing me in the night, the next day, the answers are there.
What you might provide for yourself by your effort and in your timing cannot be compared to what God has for you in his plan and in his timing. So if you are at a crossroads in your life, or if a certain desire is pushing you to hurry, fight that temptation to run ahead of God. Lay your desires at his feet and wait for his peace. God always, always has a better idea. His timing is always perfect. And his plan for you is always worth waiting for. So pray with me today, would you, saying, “Father, Psalm 27 tells me to be strong and take heart. And that’s what I want to do. So I bow before you, yielding up my hopes and dreams. I know that you’ll give me what is best and you’ll do it in your own good time. And so, I wait on you. Amen.”
© Joni and Friends