In case you couldn’t hear it, the title is riddled with sarcasm. Waiting on things is NOT fun or “joyful”. This past Sunday at church, the speaker talked about being in the “waiting room of life”. Doesn’t that just hit the nail on the head? You know what its like in a doctors office. You get there, early, fill out yet another form, and then wait. People are called before you who arrive after you and yet you are still there… just sitting and waiting. Time always seems to stand still in a waiting room. The ticks on the analog clock chink by in a pace that is exasperatingly slow.
For waiting to become a tolerable experience, one must MAKE it a tolerable experience. This requires action on our part. Of course we should continue to pray for the door to open or the window to raise, but there’s something else we can do too. And that is to pray for some encouragement while in the waiting room. I don’t know about you, but I’m in the waiting room of life right now… actually in a couple of waiting rooms! And I’m learning to wait… but now, I’m seeking to wait with encouragement. I’m praying for God to show me in whatever way He seems fit, that He has not forgotten me. That He knows I’m there watching the hands on the clock slowly tick by, before He opens the door that HE has for me.
The neat thing is that God DOES answer in the little things! When our hearts and mind are open we can see His encouragement. For me, it came in the form of a small weed, a four-leaf clover. Ever since I was a child, I have loved finding them, although for the past several years, I hadn't found a single one. Then, just a few weeks ago when I desperately needed encouragement, I found five of them. And this past Sunday, shortly after hearing the “pray for encouragement” suggestion, I found another one. Today, I found one more. It was as if God book-ended my week with a promise of encouragement. He knows where I am. He knows my heart and my desires. And in His timing, He will open a door I could never have imagined for myself. I just have … to wait!
