“Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord.” -Psalm 27:14
“Wait for the Lord and keep His way…” -Psalm 34:34
“Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for Him…” -Psalm 34:7
I wish I could write those verses with a cheerful and willing heart, but I have neither.
Today marks the end of the third week that I’ve been gone. Three weeks. That’s it.
Today also marks the one month mark that I’ve been sick. One month. Sheesh.
I had to miss two and a half days of ministry and now I’m on my third. I write these details not to receive pity or “bless her heart” but to try and fully explain where my heart is. I’m writing with dampened spirits, with an overwhelming sense of sadness and hopelessness.
I’m not good at being still; at resting. I love being active and busy and doing things and being surrounded with people and making people laugh and seeing joy through people’s smiles and their eyes. Have I experienced those things intermittently? of course! It’s the World Race and I’m surrounded by people that I have grown to love and surrounded by stories of healing and deliverance.
That’s where the hopelessness steps in. I hear these stories of healing, and selfishly begin to dwell on the lack of healing that has occurred in my body. The lack of healing that keeps me in bed, away from ministry, away from telling people about Jesus, away from singing His praises to the fullest extent. I dwell on lies whispered to me suggesting that He doesn’t hear my prayers. I dwell on thoughts of wanting to be home and in my own bed with access to my best friend 24/7 and access to medicine that I know will help speed up the process of recovery. I lay here hearing the precious laughs of children that I’m longing to hold. Children that yell out “I love you!” when I leave the ministry site. Children who have the innocence of Eden. Yet…here I lay. Still. Sick. Frustrated. Discouraged.
“Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord.” -Psalm 27:14
One of the sweetest girls I know wrote me a card with that verse on it. I opened the card the morning of the second day that I was sick…touché, Lord – it was exactly what I needed to read.
So, this past week, I’ve been thinking and praying through what it means to wait on the Lord. During Advent, one of my dearest friends, Mary Katherine, wrote a blog about waiting on the Lord and when I was reading it, I empathized to the fullest extent that I could about truly waiting on Him. Now having been practically quarantined and forced to listen and wait, I can really say that that blog has encouraged me and guided me more than I ever thought it would.
On December 17, she wrote: “In the waiting, I trust Him more. I rest in His timing. I lean into His grace. And I see His goodness. Because Christ is with me, I am learning to love the wait”
I can honestly say that I have no idea how to wait on the Lord. I have no idea what that looks like or even what that means in the fullest sense. I do know, however, that this is a time of receiving in the midst of waiting. It’s a time to rest in His timing and lean into that grace; to see His goodness through what He has given and through what I am receiving.
Receiving His teaching, His grace, His love, His guidance, His nearness, His Spirit, His timing, His covering, His solitude, His blessings, His confidence, His sanctification, His holiness, His beauty.
I’m learning how to BE STILL and wait on Him and in the waiting, receive the gifts and the attributes He has given us in His Spirit. It’s frustrating and discouraging but it’s also refining, and refinement is painful. It’s slow. It’s necessary.
Mary Katherine ends one of her blogs with this: “In His presence is the fullness of joy and whether I go through the wilderness or stand on a mountain with God, I know I want to be with Him. So with my feeble knees and weak hands, I open myself up to His leading into the barren places of my life. I trust Him to guide me tenderly through the wilderness and I’m grateful that He responds gently to my cries for another way. This season, I’m praying that God leads us to the exact places where we can most experience His life and find true joy.”
It has been my prayer that I would leave the Race looking more like Jesus, sounding more like Jesus, being more like Jesus. I had no idea that the hard process of refinement would start so early but I’m learning to welcome it, joyfully, knowing that through this – He will be more, I will be less.
