waiting for the promise

And while staying with them he ordered them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which, he said, “you heard from me; for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.”

Acts 1:4-5

Waiting on the Lord is not just an Old Testament concept. At the very birth of the church in the New Testament there was a short period of waiting for the promise of the Holy Spirit to come upon the disciples. Jesus Himself commanded His disciples to wait for this to happen. This must have been difficult and yet they waited. They had to be thrilled with their resurrected Savior. They had to be slightly rattled after they watched Him ascend back to the Father. But they were encouraged to obey the command to wait for the promise from Jesus that a coming baptism of the Holy Spirit would fall upon them.

And not many days later, at Pentecost, as they waited, God’s promises to them in Christ was fulfilled. The waiting was rewarded. The Holy Spirit blew into their house, filled the disciples, and enabled them to speak the gospel clearly in all the languages of all the scattered Jews gathered in Jerusalem for the feast. The promised Spirit led them to see three thousand conversions to the gospel as Jesus’ promise to them was wildly fulfilled. This was a work of God well worth the wait!

As evidenced in Acts, waiting on what God promises is rewarded. Obeying with patience so that God’s power can provide gives God all the glory. It is SO worth it! And the rewards of waiting are the work of God. We should be encouraged in that knowledge when we wait. The power of God provides while we wait and the work of God moves forward when He moves after the wait. Both of those experiences grow us as we obey Jesus.

Lord,

In seasons of waiting, Your power will be known. I rest in that. I trust You. I will wait. You will blow into this life and show Yourself wonderful!

Amen

Waiting for THE Day

“Therefore wait for me,” declares the LORD,

“for the day when I rise up to seize the prey.

For my decision is to gather nations,

to assemble kingdoms,

to pour out upon them my indignation,

all my burning anger;

for in the fire of my jealousy

all the earth shall be consumed.”

Zephaniah 3:8

Sometimes we wait for what we do not want to see. There is a time appointed by God yet to come in which all the world WILL answer to Him. We generically refer to it as Judgment Day. The Bible most often calls it “The Day of the Lord”. In that day all the world will be judged. It will be found guilty of sinful rebellion against God. Humans will bow before God as Judge. Those who do not know Christ as Savior will know His justice and His wrath against sin. The picture here is of a lion seizing his prey. Nothing escapes this grip. The world cannot evade the judgment that is certain to come from the Lion of the tribe of Judah.

Yet even as that fearful vision is part of what the saints should wait to see God do, that alone is not the end. Instead, that final “Day of the Lord” reckoning with all people of all time will transform the universe into a new heavens and a new earth. Emerging from that day is a new world in which all people “call upon the name of the Lord and serve him with one accord” (Zephaniah 3:9). Worship of God will by untainted by sin and human pride (Zephaniah 3:11). People will be humble, worshipful, truthful, love justice, and the world will be at peace (Zephaniah 3:12). This is the scene we are waiting for! It comes first by fiery judgment, but after the ashes, beautiful new worlds will blossom like a new Eden!

Lord,

Your Day will arrive. All my waiting now, in a broken world, in the sorrow of sin’s losses that inevitably come to me, in my repentance and pain, all of that will literally one day melt away! Thank You, Lord for this big picture of both Your justice and Your redeeming re-creation. That vision makes all my present waiting well worth it!

Amen

the Word of God, waiting, and faith

For still the vision awaits its appointed time;

it hastens to the end—it will not lie.

If it seems slow, wait for it;

it will surely come; it will not delay.

“Behold, his soul is puffed up; it is not upright within him,

but the righteous shall live by his faith.

Habakkuk 2:3-4

Three important spiritual concepts are linked together in these two verses: vision, waiting on the Lord, and faith. It is good to understand how they are related to one another.

VISION. The vision specific to this concept harkens back to Habakkuk 1:17 where the prophet questions how long the cruel Chaldeans (whom God has revealed will destroy Israel) will be allowed to be brutal. It does not seem to square with God’s fairness and justice. God has already revealed to the nation through Habakkuk that a day will come when rebellious Israel would be mercilessly invaded and absorbed by Chaldea. But in answer to the prophet, God also sends a “vision” that the Chaldeans themselves would eventually be judged. So the vision is referring to two clear concepts: 1) the revelation only God can give. 2) the certainty of what God has revealed. The “vision” WILL come. It will not delay. God’s revealed truth is thus always fact… especially when it comes to prophecy.

WAITING. From our perspective sometimes the revealed truth seems slow to come to fruition. But God’s Word is not bound by the same rules of time as our day to day lives. An eternal God (Who has always been, is, and always will be… think about that for a few minutes and your mind will blow!) will surely do His purposes in His time. We must wait for His will to be done… His kingdom to come. It will. 

FAITH. We believe and trust God. The proud and the wicked dismiss both vision (God’s revelation in His Word) and waiting. To wait then as a believer in God is to patiently trust in His promises. How do we wait on the Lord? “…the righteous shall live by his faith.” Human pride rejects revelation, patience, and faith. But God’s redeemed people will treasure all three and are kept in their waiting by faith in God’s certain Word.

Determined

But as for me, I will look to the LORD;

I will wait for the God of my salvation;

my God will hear me.

Micah 7:7

As I wait through these changes

You are bringing in me, Lord,

I will wait with determination,

You comfort, strengthen, lead me by Your Word,

Looking around me, circumstances

just might intimidate me.

But trusting to look to You my Lord,

Your grace and providence invigorate me.

As I look by faith, never really alone,

I see my Lord’s love and tender care

and in that waiting I am sure

His provision and purpose meet me there!

The God Who did not spare His Son

to save my sinful, wandering soul

will be equally magnificent in this time

to heal my loss and make me whole.

To God I cry, my God I praise

and find confidence in my crying out.

He holds me close, He bends His ear,

He shelters me without a doubt.

I am determined to look to the Lord.

I am determined to know His love in my life.

I am determined on God to wait.

He will hear me, heal me, make me thrive!

Waiting: fruit of repentance

So you, by the help of your God, return,

hold fast to love and justice,

and wait continually for your God.

Hosea 12:6

God, through His prophet Hosea, makes an appeal to His people Israel to return in repentance to Him. This appeal to repentance comes in the midst of God’s indictment against Israel. It is a gracious offer. Israel had a slippery past. God remembered that Jacob, the heel-grabbing conniving patriarch who wrestled with God, had always struggled. He wept and fought with the angel of the Lord, begging God’s favor (Hosea 12:4a). The patriarch met with God in Bethel and there God spoke to Jacob and to all his descendants (Hosea 12:4b). God affirmed His covenant with Jacob, renaming Him and all His future generations “Israel” - strives with God.

It is to this past that God appeals. He wants His people to remember all the good He has done with them even with the baggage of that kind of past. He wants them to repent of their present idolatry, greed and unfaithfulness. He wants to once again help them find His blessing as they obey the covenant. And what God waits for as they return to Him shows us what He expects of people who are committed to faithfulness.

Here is what God wanted of Israel:

1) He wanted them to hold fast to love. Just like Jacob clung to the angel begging for blessing, God wanted Israel to hold fast to love… to love the Law… to love the Lord their God with all their heart, soul, mind, and strength. Faithful love is worth the tenacity to keep believing God.

2) He wanted them to hold fast to justice. If God’s people love God, they will love His righteousness and want to see it NOW in the world. They will not tolerate the way sin creates inequities, injustices, and awful discriminations. They will want to see sin punished and righteousness exalted. They will want to see sin forgiven and grace rolling like a mighty river through the world.

3) He wanted them to continuously wait on the Lord. To hold fast to love and justice in an unloving and unjust world absolutely REQUIRES we faithfully, patiently wait by faith for God’s will to be done. This insight into waiting is important. God wants me to wait, holding fast in grace to His love, righteousness, and justice. How I wait will show the quality and perseverance of my faith.

Waiting’s good.

The LORD is good to those who wait for him,

to the soul who seeks him.

It is good that one should wait quietly

for the salvation of the LORD.

Lamentations 3:25-26

And so I start my work week with a fresh reminder this Monday morning that, contrary to my default settings, I must love and appreciate the God on Whom I wait. There are two reasons from these two verses that lead me to believe this. And their perspective is wonderful. I reflect on them and find comfort and encouragement.

REASON ONE: God is good to me as I wait. Waiting is not a punishment. It isn’t some kind of mean-spirited “test” meant to bring me pain or frustration. God is good in the waiting. I repeat: He is good to me as I wait for Him. God will bring good to me as I wait. He will do it as I simply by faith trust Him still. I wrongly bring frustration to the wait with my impatience, a demanding spirit, distrust, myopic focus of my limited viewpoint, and wrong expectations. But God will bring good if I repent of my own self-directed agenda in the waiting. I will seek that level of trust in God. He is good as I seek Him!

REASON TWO: Waiting is a good process. Why? It will result in deliverance because ultimately all waiting points to salvation. And that makes waiting “good news” — a gospel experience. It points to Jesus Who has delivered me from all my sins, all my suffering, all my sorrows, having carried them all on the cross. The gospel is the salvation for all that’s wrong in my life: my sin AND my suffering. The gospel is sufficient! All I need to trust is that, waiting quietly for the final outcome of my salvation to arrive. This is a good thing. It makes me trust. It quiets my soul. It brings the peace that surpasses understanding as in prayer I release my needs and wait in that peace for God to do His good work!

Lord,

You are good as I wait. Thank You for pouring grace upon me in this season. And the waiting itself is good because from it I will see my salvation in You Lord Jesus! Help me wait on a good God for the good for me that is sure to come.

Amen

Waiting for nothing less than God

From of old no one has heard

or perceived by the ear,

no eye has seen a God besides you,

who acts for those who wait for him.

Isaiah 64:4

Unless I am waiting on God, I am waiting on the wrong things. There is only One Who acts for those who wait for Him. No other false idol will truly satisfy. False idols create false hope that always disappoints. But God will be there for those who by faith in Him will wait for Him. And I will take my comfort, find my courage, and place my confidence in this fact!

I have been learning that in seasons of intense change, I am given the opportunity to really stretch my faith. Will I trust God to heal my past? Will I trust God to provide right now in my pain, confusion, or heartache? Will I trust God to bring a remade new life to my future that feels so uncertain? Will I wait in faith in Him as I long for these answers and lament my situation? Those are the questions I must entrust to the Lord by faith right now. It is too easy to be distracted by all kinds of false hopes that become false gods to me.

So far in this season of grief and growth I am learning to avoid a few false hopes that have been disappointments to me. Here are three of them:

• The false hope of artificial community. In the age of Facebook and Instagram it is easy to think there is comfort in words and pictures. There is not. Give me face-to-face, heart-to-heart, soul-to-soul real fellowship around the common bond of Jesus Christ instead! Yes, some helpful communication can come via electronic means, but it always comes from people with whom I already have a strong personal, face-to-face, loving relationship.
• The false hope of superficial change. I can make physical changes that are not addressing my true spiritual need. I might benefit from healthier living, but that alone does not alleviate my loneliness. I might buy a new wardrobe. I might lose weight. I might improve my appearance. I might, and have, done all those things, but really, I just look better while still dealing with the same issues! Nothing superficial will create the comfort and change that God will bring as I wait for Him.
• The false hope of intoxicating busy-ness. I can pour myself into new activities and full ministry. In so doing, I have found myself trying to fill a void by “making” myself feel wanted, indispensable, and needed. The brief high I get from this only leads to a crash again once I am all alone. Serving as a “man pleaser” is not service waiting on God to supply. It is a false hope when done with my selfish energy and not from devotion to Christ. 

Lord, 

There is nothing like You. You act for me, in me, with me, for Your glory and my good. I hope ONLY in You! I turn from false hopes, from idols I have worshiped instead of You. You are my hope because You act for me!

Amen