While We Wait, May We Also Seek

I know about the waiting. 
And trust me when I tell you that it’s not always easy.
Whether you’re waiting for a job, for a baby, for a proposal, for the sickness to leave, for the pain to pass… it’s not always a smooth and uncomplicated process.

Waiting is oftentimes very difficult.  Waiting challenges our patience and undermines our endurance.  Our good sense of judgement is often impaired during the waiting process, and in our impatience for long-delayed answers to prayer, we sometimes become bitter, cynical, and mentally troubled.

But if there is one thing I have learned in my seasons of waiting is that they can, indeed, become invitations of intimacy.

I’ve often wondered why setbacks seems to come at the most inopportune time.
Like the time I sprained my ankle not even 2 months into a new job, causing me to be laid up and off work for almost 2 weeks.
Like the time my sweet husband experienced a major health crisis while on a business trip just days before Christmas, causing life-threatening complications that nearly devastated our family.
Like the job loss that came in the middle of an already bank-draining season.

And God and I would have long and serious talks about these events, and like David, I found myself pouring my heart wide open to Him in my discomfort.

“My heart is breaking as I remember how it used to be.”  Psalm 42:4
“I am exhausted and completely crushed.  My groans come from an anguished heart.”  Psalm 38:8
“Has God forgotten to be gracious?  Has He slammed the door on His compassion?”  Psalm 77:9

And yet in my weariness I felt the Lord lovingly respond, “My child, this isn’t a lack of compassion on My part.  This is simply an invitation to deeper waters with Me.”

I would sense it in my spirit in the fall of 2018.  Following a severely long and drawn-out health dilemma, and a considerably large surgery for which I wasn’t recovering as quickly as I would've hoped, the Lord in His kindness spoke.  It came when I least expected it, but at just the right time, as I could feel the pressure mounting and the spiritual fatigue find it’s way to the surface.

It was a Saturday evening and my heart felt as though it could take no more.
I was tired.
I was in pain.
And I was mentally, physically, and emotionally crippled by the afflictions I was facing.
And the wait.
The waiting was always the worst.

But God.

And there in my chair I heard His gentle whisper in my spirit.
It felt like an invitation.
An invitation into intimacy.
An invitation into relationship.
An invitation onto the waters, regardless of how hazardous they felt.

Because isn’t He always calling… the Pursuer of my heart?
“Come follow Me…”  Matthew 4:19
“‘Yes, come.’ Jesus said.”  Matthew 14:29
“Come to Me, all who labor and are heavy laden”  Matthew 11:29
“Come, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters…”  Isaiah 55:1
“The Spirit and the Bride say, ‘Come.’ And let the one who hears say, ‘Come.’ And let the one who is thirsty come; let the one who desires take the water of life without price.”  Rev 22:17

It’s all an invitation.
And in the waiting seasons especially.

And so I ask you, too, the question I have asked myself for months now: What are you waiting for?  Could this be an invitation for you to enter into a season of deeper waters with Him?

Oh that we would make good use of the waiting seasons in our lives.  That we would consider the One who beckons us to, “come”.  It’s our heart He’s after.  It’s our time.  The two most precious commodities we posses.

And so take this time.  This waiting room you’re sitting in now, and while you wait, seek to know Him better.

The time has never been more perfect!
“Indeed, the ‘right time’ is now. Today is the day of salvation.”  2 Cor 6:2