As I’ve considered the idea of waiting, I’ve noticed the prominence of waiting in Scripture. Noah waits for the dove to return to the ark; Abram waits for a child; Jacob waits and works for 14 years until he is able to take the woman he loves; Joseph waits for several years for deliverance from prison; the Israelites wait for hundreds of years in Egypt crying out to the Lord for deliverance before Moses shows up … and that’s just in the first two books of the Bible! This list goes on and on.
It occurred to me that the times between “action”—our times of waiting—are times of preparation for what is to come. In these times we learn to trust and hope and pray. Without those times of waiting, we’d find ourselves as fat children who are lazy and complacent.
We get a glimpse of the goodness of waiting in Luke 8. Jairus comes to Jesus and asks Him to heal his daughter, and Jesus says, “Yes!” However, when a bleeding woman reaches out to touch the hem of Jesus’ garment and is healed, Jesus stops, knowing power has gone out from Him. He calls her out, asking to hear her story. Can you imagine Jairus in this moment? He’s been promised that his daughter will be healed, and now he has to wait as Jesus interacts with this woman.
Even as Jesus forgives the sins of the bleeding woman, Jairus is told that his daughter is dead. If only they hadn’t waited. But it’s not too late for Jesus. Jairus doesn’t see his daughter healed, he sees Jesus raise her from the dead. Do you see? In this time of waiting, Jairus sees Jesus more clearly—His ability to heal, His deep compassion and love as He interacts with a needy woman, His mercy as He forgives her sins, and then the great power of Jesus when He raises Jairus’ little girl from the dead. If Jesus had gone straight to Jairus’ house, Jairus would have missed out on seeing more deeply who Jesus was.
There are things I want in my life: things I hope will happen, places I hope I will go. For these things, I wait, holding loosely to them and asking God to reform my hopes so they conform to His will. There are things God promises us in His word—He will return, we’ll be made holy, we’ll receive glorified bodies, there will be a new heaven and new earth. For these things, I wait, knowing they will happen. And if I must choose between having things now, or waiting for them and seeing Jesus’ power, mercy, grace and love the way Jairus did, I choose to wait. How deeply gracious of God allow us to wait.
Dig Deeper: Romans 8:23-25, Luke 8
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