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Presented by Lauren Stibgen
Are you waiting for something? Waiting is defined as a period of pause, interval, or delay. A noun. What are some of the things we wait for? As working women, the complexity of this list can span far beyond your day-to-day job. Waiting can be professional, but it can also be deeply personal.
At work maybe you are waiting for a promotion or a raise or even recognition and reward for a job well done. Personally, you may be waiting for health or healing, children, friendship, marriage, love, a new home, or other provision. Is it waiting to be reunited? Or reconciliation? Do you need an apology or are you waiting to give one? This list is not exhaustive.
One of the ways I reassure myself during times of waiting is in knowing I am not alone. We all experience times of waiting. Often the Bible describes this waiting as a period in the wilderness or a valley. These words, wilderness and valley seem big, deep, maybe dark, and like you may be losing your way. It can bring us to ask questions of God. The words in Psalm 77:7-9 that Asaph writes resonate:
Will the Lord reject forever?
Will he never show his favor again?
Has his unfailing love vanished forever?
Has his promise failed for all time?
Has God forgotten to be merciful?
Has he in anger withheld his compassion (Psalm 77:7-9)?
This interval or delay can be as short as hours or as long as years. It’s really just any amount of time that exceeds what we have deemed as reasonable in our own mind. It is a period of time we have asked and not received, sought an answer and haven’t found it, and knocked on a door that has not yet been answered like we are told to do in Matthew 7:7-8.
When that “acceptable time passes”, our questions start.
The good news is there is another side of waiting we will talk about this week, because waiting isn’t only a noun.