The Crucible of Waiting

Reflections for this date are based on the following scripture passages:
Matthew 22	Matthew 23	Matthew 24	Genesis 15	Matthew 16

Waiting on the Lord is one of, if not the most difficult thing we do as a follower of Christ. But it is also one of, if not the greatest demonstration of our faith. Genesis, chapter 15 gives account of God's promise to Abram that his offspring would be as numerous as the stars in the sky. (V. 6) God followed this promise with a covenant, "I give this land to your offspring, from the brook of Egypt to the Euphrates River." (Gen 15:18) We are told that "Abram believed the Lord, and He credited it to him as righteousness."

God's promise and covenant with Abram must have been an exciting experience for Abram, but then time passed without seeing evidence of this promise. After 10 years of waiting Abram was 85 years old and the promise of an offspring was no more evident than when God made the promise. So he and his wife began to question the promise and to justify other means of fulfilling it. God said Abram's heir would come from his own body, but maybe He didn't mean it would be Sarai's child? This thinking led to an alternate plan that was of their creation and not God's. Waiting on God tested Abram's faith and it came up wanting. Yes, he still believed God would give him an heir, but he doubted how it would occur and took his own measures to make it happen.

After centuries of waiting for God's promised Messiah, the gospel of Matthew records how misconstrued the Jews had made the promise. They had so misconstrued it that they rejected the Messiah when He came. And yet another example of how the difficulty of waiting on the Lord twists our faith is given in chapter 24 of Matthew. In this chapter Jesus addressed His disciples' question about the signs of His coming and of the "end of the age." This wait will also test the faith of Jesus' followers. As the wait is prolonged people will begin to grasp at possibilities saying, "Look he's in the wilderness," or, "Look he's in the inner rooms." But we are not to believe these rumors. Nor are we to believe those who make predictions of when His coming will take place. Not even the Son Himself knows when it will be! What we can know, though, is that it will be when we least expect it and we should be prepared at all times. We can also know that, "The one who endures to the end will be delivered." (Matt 24:13)

The follower of Christ is often called on to wait, and it is in those periods of waiting when we often learn the most and our faith is strengthened the most. As I reflect on the periods in my life of waiting on the Lord, they seem to have occurred in three year periods. From the time I felt the Lord directing me in a particular direction and committing myself to that direction and then waiting to see that direction fulfilled would be a period of three years. I see these as some of the most difficult periods in my walk with the Lord. And yet I emerged from each of these periods more strengthened in my faith and more committed to the Lord than when I entered them. When I emerged out of these periods, as emerging from a fog into a clear day, I was often reminded of Psalms 30:5 which says, "Weeping may spend the night, but there is joy in the morning."