The Waiting Isn't a Waste

Tom Petty’s song “The Waiting” still strikes a chord, long after its release in 1981. Whether it’s waiting in line, waiting in traffic, waiting for food at our favorite eatery, biding our time well can be “the hardest part.” We have been conditioned to believe we can have it our way, right away. First it was Sanka instant coffee, and then drive-through burgers and fries, and now practically everything else.

Our contempt for waiting is not merely the product of social media trends, generational swings, and Amazon deliveries; it is an expression of something profoundly human. Not that waiting has ever been easy, but God has provided us with the necessary resources to see its value and potential.

The psalmist calls us to wait patiently for the Lord; “I waited patiently for the Lord; he inclined to me and heard my cry.” (Psalm 40:1).  And Isaiah promises that those “who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint” (Isaiah 40:31).

Waiting is the ongoing bottleneck in the life of faith. And waiting is the rhythm of a healthy heart’s desire: “O Lord, we wait for you; your name and remembrance are the desire of our soul” (Isaiah 26:8). Waiting is the reverberation of the matchless power and grace of God, “who acts for those who wait for him” (Isaiah 64:4).

With the eons of waiting for the Messiah to show up, you might think the waiting would be over once Jesus had come. But we wait as much as ever, called to live with the tension of waiting for His return. We “wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Corinthians 1:7); we are a people “waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ” (Titus 2:13). We are that community which has “turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, and to wait for his Son from heaven” (1 Thessalonians 1:9-10).

Since Jesus’ return to heaven, the church has spent two-plus millennia in a never-ending waiting room. We “groan inwardly as we wait…” (Romans 8:23). And as we wait, we “keep [ourselves] in the love of God” by “waiting for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ that leads to eternal life” (Jude 21).

The elusive fruit, then, which corresponds to this condition, is patience. It is the first quality of love— “love is patient…” (1 Corinthians 13:4) — and an often-repeated exhortation (See: 1 Thessalonians 5:14; 2 Timothy 5:14; 2 Timothy 2:24; 4:2). Eternal life belongs to “those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality” (Romans 2:7).

Patience is the companion of humility and the opponent of pride. “The patient in spirit is better than the proud in spirit” (Ecclesiastes 7:8). It’s an appropriate attitude of the person smart enough to say, “God is God, and I am not.” And patience is not of our own making, but “the fruit (the product) of the Spirit” (Galatians 5:22; 5:5).

It’s in the development of patience where we most feel the weight of sanctification and the groans prompted by the Spirit (See: Romans 8:23). At times, it can seem we’re becoming more like Jesus almost effortlessly; the wind of the Spirit in our sails, as we feed the nourishment of self-forgetfulness.

But part of waiting is being aware of the frustration of the wait. We swallow the bitter pill of patience, which sometimes gets stuck in our craw. It’s not patience if we’re unaware of the drag of waiting. And so, when we’re stuck in the waiting room of life, we have Divine assistance for dealing with the delay. So, allow me to offer a pathway for cultivating patience while you wait.

1. Renew Faith and Hope

Recalibrate the focus of your faith. Move from the stagnation of trust in self and deliberately reorient to God. Whether it’s simply spare moments or seemingly endless days, waiting is no waste. It’s in the delays—feeling dead in the water—and in becoming more aware of just how anemic our patience is, that He works to move us from self-reliance and refresh our faith and hope in Him.

Patience comes with faith (See: 2 Timothy 3:10; Hebrews 6:12) — faith in the moment, and a tenacious hope in the future. Faith feeds hope, and when “we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience” (Romans 8:25).

2. Pray and Give Thanks—a Lot

The invitation to “be patient in tribulation” is followed by the reminder to “be constant in prayer” (See: Romans 12:12). A healthy prayer life has eyes to see the opportunities in, and a heart that discerns the unwelcome moments of waiting.

And thanksgiving plays a significant role in cultivating “patience with joy.” So, pray Paul’s prayer: that we may be “strengthened with all power, according to his glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy, giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light” (Colossians 1:11-12).

How do we “put on...patience” (See: Colossians 3:12)? Be thankful! “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.” (Colossians 3:15-17)

Few things will aid in passing the time as effectively as counting our blessings and then naming them to God.

3. Remember the Patience of God

The aggravation of waiting can point us to the astonishing patience of God. We owe everything to His kindness and patience with us. “Do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God’s kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?” (Romans 2:4).

God was patient when our first parents sinned. His “patience waited in the days of Noah” (1 Peter 3:20). He was patient with Abraham and Sarah. He was patient with Israel.  He showed His patience through the prophets (See: James 5:10).

Jesus is the climactic display of God’s patience toward sinners (See: 1 Timothy 1:16). He is “patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance” (2 Peter 3:9). We “count the patience of our Lord as salvation” (2 Peter 3:15) and rest on His promise, in all our waiting, to “sustain you to the end” (1 Corinthians 1:8).

I’m thinking that Tom Petty was onto something when he sang about the waiting: “You take it on faith, you take it to the heart.” The annoying intrusions of waiting, whether heavy or ho-hum, are opportunities to welcome God into every moment, even when it feels like it’s “the hardest part.”