Daily Verse: Lamentations 3:24

I say to myself, "The LORD is my portion; therefore I will wait for him."

Patience and waiting is something that we become more uncomfortable with as each new day dawns. We are in the era of instant information, instant response, instant gratification. We like to seek solutions, identify them quickly, and resolve the problem. And if our search is sluggish or delayed, we find a different path to take…rarely do we pause and wait. This mentality can prove troublesome when it comes to our prayers. When we share a need with God through prayer, we naturally expect a relatively quick response.  We know God is not like Google, expected to produce an answer instantly…but we still desire a response in the next day or so. And when it doesn’t come, maybe we get frustrated, angry, or hopeless. Maybe we start to doubt prayer…maybe we think we are better off on our own, seeking what we need through the hands of man instead of the incomparable wisdom of God. The thing is, God has his own timing…and it almost always is different than ours. It doesn’t mean that God is not listening…that God doesn’t care…that God is not real. It simply means that we must wait…that for some reason God has decided to pause in his response. It is often during these times of delay that we grow the most in our relationship with God…in times where we are experiencing some kind of struggle, difficulty, or hardship…the relationship between God and man is strengthened. Maybe God is delaying because he wants to deepen his connection with us…maybe he thinks that a quick response will provide the quick satisfaction that we seek and we will move on, leaving the relationship superficial and lacking. If the response was quick, maybe we wouldn’t have time to become deeply committed  to prayer. If there was instant gratification, maybe there wouldn’t be sufficient time to acknowledge our dependence on God. If we got the answer in our time, leaving only a short period of wanting, maybe our faith wouldn’t be bolstered and developed for a harder battle down the road. Whatever the reason, waiting on the Lord is a good thing…just see Lamentations 3:26, “it is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the LORD”. Make no mistake, in our times of waiting, the Lord is working in our lives…developing our faith in him, deepening the relationship with him, and responding in ways we never could have imagined. May we trust him today and wait on his perfect response! To God be the glory!