Wait… wait, wait, wait… sigh… wait your turn, wait for me, wait until later, take a seat and wait, wait until the light changes, wait, wait, wait. To be perfectly honest, I am not good at waiting. I totally get little kids and their impatience when they are told to wait for something. It always feels way longer than it is. I have started to look at the clock to see when I start waiting for something, so I can reinforce when time is up that it wasn’t as long as it felt. The lights were only 3 minutes, or the line was only 5 minutes, but this trick does not help when there are seasons of waiting, those times I did not see the beginning, but the overwhelming message is wait. There is no time frame, and I am not quite sure what it is I am waiting for, but I know I am in a waiting season, and it looks so different than other waiting seasons.
The current season of waiting that I am in is an active wait. There are still things that need to be done. There are still lessons that God has for me in this waiting season. I am still being invited to join Him in the Kingdom work, but the wait is still obvious. At times it feels very unsettling because I am not sure what I am specifically waiting for. What is the goal? What is the duration? Do I need to learn something specific before I can go on to the next season? What specifically am I waiting for? Or is God waiting on me?
When I fall into the hole of going around and around, trying to figure out the answers to these questions, usually the quiet voice nudges me to be still and know that He is God, and that He wants to show more of Himself to me. He wants to help me walk in this season, as well as rest in this season with him. It is not an exam, but a season.
My one friend changed it up from wait as a command that leads to great impatience to more of an excited anticipation of wait for it. The book of Isaiah seems to be filled with anticipation waiting for what God is going to do. “See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland.” (Isaiah 43:19) It turns waiting into looking and listening as I trust that in God’s fullness of time. Remembering He will do something beyond what I am asking or imagining if I am willing to wait. “Wait for the Lord; Be strong and let your heart take courage; Yes, wait for the Lord. ” (Psalm 27:14)
* I am joining Five Minute Fridays in a 31 day Writing Challenge. Each day I will be writing on a different word prompt for at least 5 minutes for the month of October.
**Check out 2018’s 31 Day Writing Challenge https://inkblotlife.com/category/write-31-days-2018/
Inkblot Life 
Reblogged this on Inkblot Life and commented:
This blog post came up in my memories today. As I re-read this post, I am in the now and not yet of the same waiting. Some parts of this story have become clear and other parts are still have fuzzy. Three years out from this post I am still learning what it looks like to wait and abide. This post reminded me that it is an invitation to something more not just an endurance test. When I reframe it and see it that way, I find rest and many gifts along the way that I know I would miss if I was hyper-focused on the end of the waiting. Just writing the words “end of the waiting” makes me laugh now. There is no such thing. There is always the now and not yet of life. I am slowly learning to move through these seasons looking for the invitations instead of trying to solve the mystery like I am trapped in an escape room.
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