Wait

www.bible.com/1713/psa.27.14.csb

In a hurry today? Life moving really fast today? Never seem to find your footing? Wait.

The Lord knows exactly what we need. As our Creator and Designer, He knows what we need. We to need to wait. But wait on what, exactly? What are we waiting for?

We have a drive, a need to make things happen. We live under the understanding that if we do not make it happen, it won’t. There are merits to this, calling for people to be proactive rather than reactive. But sometimes, we need to wait. So what are we waiting for?

A classic example of this is found in Genesis. Abraham was promised a son. But he and his wife Sarah were both well along in years. So Sarah, imagining herself in the place of God, suggested that Abraham marry her much younger servant-girl, Hagar. Abraham agreed. Not sure why. But maybe he thought this was how God’s will would be satisfied. He didn’t ask God about it. God didn’t say anything. God silently waited behind the scenes while Hagar conceived and bore a son, Abraham’s first wife to do so, making the child, Ishmael, the heir to his estate. Once all of this was done, however, God speaks. He tells Abraham that Ishmael would never be Abraham’s proper heir. That child would be borne through the octogenarian Sarah, contrary to what everyone knew then and now about conception, pregnancy and childbirth. Ishmael would be relegated to second-born status, and Isaac, the child of Abraham and Sarah, would be the heir.

Of course, bad blood existed between Isaac and Ishmael due to this apparent faux pas in inheritance rules. Ishmael went off and founded the Arab nation, while Isaac became the second father of the Jews. You can probably figure out how that’s turned out.

I think what we learn from Abraham’s experience is that God keeps His promises, and He doesn’t need our help. If God says He will do something, then we can trust Him to do it. All we need to do is to be faithful. By marrying a second woman, Abraham violated the precedent of the Garden (Adam and Eve). This first violation led to the family conflict between his wives, Sarah and Hagar and the expulsion of Hagar and Ishmael from his family. This led to Hagar and Ishmael nearly dying in the wilderness (until God intervened). But in some ways, the modern Jewish-Arab conflict finds its roots in Abraham’s sin, because he didn’t wait.

Your choices have far reaching consequences. Many make a decision to have sex before the covenant of marriage. Do I even have to talk about how much of a mistake that is? The question, “Who’s the father?” is often met with blank stares. And now children are running the streets raised with little or no discipline, tearing down statues of history, because they don’t know where they came from. The sexual revolution of the sixties has now come to fruition.

Some decisions are just better waiting for, than trying to violate God’s promises and rules for our conduct. Disaster lies along that path.

Dear Lord, help me to wait upon You. I know there are some things I want so badly that I go around Your rules, bend Your rules, even violate Your rules to get what I want. I know that’s wrong, and I have seen the mistakes of my actions. Lord, help me bear through these lessons, and learn to wait on You. Help me today Lord. I pray these things in Jesus’ Name, Amen.