While We Wait

 Hi everyone! First of all, I'm sorry this post is a little late. I'm not starting off so well as far as consistency goes.... :/ BUT I was out of town! At the most beautiful place:



Our cabin! (Cue angel chorus)

We had a HUGE flood last summer, so my family had to go up to check on the work being done. It is the first time EVER I have gotten to see it in the snow!!! Ahhhh so magical.

Anyway, that's my excuse for being late with my posting. Also, note that I am very tired writing this post. Bear with me if it is slightly incoherent. 

All of that being said, I have read all of the posts on the Facebook group (I'm so happy to see so many people involved and being such an awesome support group to each other!), and I noticed that many of them center around the topic of "waiting" - waiting for a job, or maybe for the right guy, or even just waiting to see how God's plan for us pans out. Many of us are in a season of our life where this topic is just especially relevant. Many times, at least for me, it seems like I'm waiting on everything. Because we are young adults, and so much is unknown and undiscovered. 

Remember when you were little and your mom put you down for a nap? If you were anything like me (or...ahem...my sister), you wouldn't go without putting up a mean fight! I don't know why, looking at it now, but naps are the worst things in the world to kids. Ugh...so painful. But moms are going to get a nap out of you, whether you kick and scream or not. It's inevitable. So why waste all that energy and frustrate the both of you?

That's how I've been looking at "waiting" lately. 

In my opinion, God has a perfect and beautiful plan for us. That plan will be fulfilled in His perfect timing. Whether we choose to be patient and happy with that or whether we choose to be uncomfortable and squirmy like a child at nap time is completely up to us. 

I think we can all vouch that being patient is really hard. It can be difficult for several reasons. It is personally hardest for me in that sometimes I can't tell if I should wait (meaning, take no action in my current situation, leaving it completely in God's hands) or take affirmative action (make a choice, and have faith that God will take that choice and still lead me where He wants me. For example, in my unemployment I often wonder: "Should I just take it easy and let God open the right door for me? Or should I take more steps - place matters into my own hands a little more - and see where God leads me that way? 

That's my personal battle with patience, but it is different for each person (I assume.) 

Now knowing that it is obviously a difficult virtue to develop, we can say that because of its difficulty, it builds our spiritual character. ....and that's really awesome. God doesn't ever give us anything we can't handle, but He does give us some character-building challenges. Because He wants us to grow in Him! Isn't it awesome that he cares about us enough to want us and help us to grow stronger, more solid?? Sorry, I just got a wave of excitement when I thought of that....wow. YEEYUH. 

So...how can we develop our patience in Christ?

1. First of all, it's good to know that every (stinkin') bad experience we go through is actually used to build virtue within us. So bad things we go through are actually awesome. It's all in the way we look at it. ( <--- Jedi mind tricks? No? Ok.) Seriously though, the more we wait... the better we get at it AND the stronger we get. That's why James says:

"Consider it a sheer gift, friends, when tests and challenges come at you from all sides. You know that under pressure, your faith-life is forced into the open and shows its true colors. So don’t try to get out of anything prematurely. Let it do its work so you become mature and well-developed, not deficient in any way." -James 1:2-4 (MSG)

He knows that only good things come from the situations God hands us. He knows wassup. 

2. Another thing we can do to help develop our patience is....
.....work on our physical patience! It kind of sounds silly at first, but I truly believe in a strong connection between character and virtue. If we practice patience in everyday life, well....it's kind of like muscle-memory in dance - it'll just come more naturally to us in all aspects of our lives. There are many opportunities to practice patience, daily. Let's start seeing those opportunities in a positive light and use them to make us spiritually stronger! (I'm excited to do this...like really excited.)

3. The obvious: PRAY! Praying is like spiritual Windex - it can fix anything! ( <--- If you get that reference, I love you.) Seriously, I overlook this all too often. God listens to and helps us through any and all of our problems. This problem is no exception. In the Bible, many people prayed about patience. Heck, some of those people were frustrated and let God know! Psalm 44:23-26 says:

Get up, God! Are you going to sleep all day?

    Wake up! Don’t you care what happens to us?

Why do you bury your face in the pillow?

    Why pretend things are just fine with us?

And here we are—flat on our faces in the dirt,

    held down with a boot on our necks.

Get up and come to our rescue.

    If you love us so much, Help us! (MSG)

Pray to God for help, and He will help you, period. He loves us and wants us to grow stronger as Christians. Next time we find ourselves especially impatient, let's pray about it right then and there and just see how much it helps! 


Hopefully this post was helpful. I'm glad that I have an awesome support group of Godly women that are going through some of the same things as I am. The thing is, we are going to wait on God no matter what. We get to choose whether we will do that either uncomfortably or patiently. Let's choose patiently. Together. 



BTW, I didn't proof-read this. Too tired. I apologize if there are any blaring grammatical errors. Okay. That's all.













DEUCES.