Written by Pia Wilcox (PoP’s Relations Manager)
Waiting is never our favorite thing to do.
We live in a world where a lot of things seem to be “instant”.
Running late for work and have no time to brew your coffee? Don’t stress out, there’s instant coffee!
Hungry and don’t feel like cooking? Just grab some hot water and pour it on your instant noodles!
Doing a last-minute research on a topic for your school assignment? Don’t bother, there’s instant internet search!
This world has taught us that most of our needs and desires can be instantly gratified. Our patience is indeed tried and tested when we are not able to get what we want in a snap of our fingers.
We tend to look at waiting time as wasted time.
While the saying “time is gold” is also true in its context, waiting doesn’t necessarily mean that we are wasting our precious time.
Take for example, you planted a Chinese bamboo seed on the exact same day that you planted banana seedlings. A year later, the banana trees have started bearing fruits while the bamboo tree still hasn’t shown up. Year after year passed by and still no sign of the bamboo tree.
You might be wondering, what happened?
A Chinese bamboo tree takes around five years to grow and mature. It has to be watered and fertilized in the ground where it has been planted every single day. It doesn’t break through the ground until the fifth year. But once it breaks through, it will grow 90 feet tall in five weeks! Imagine that? If at any time the person who planted it gave up and stopped watering and fertilizing that seed, it would die before it even sprouts.
Waiting teaches us to be patient.
One attribute of love that we can learn while we wait is patience. It is especially difficult when we have no idea what’s happening underground or behind the curtain and we don’t see any visible results yet. Like in the story of the bamboo tree, no visible results doesn’t mean that nothing is being cultivated or developed in places that are beyond our sight.
Waiting helps us to trust God.
We sometimes tend to try to do things on our own, in order to ease our pain or to solve our problems. I myself am guilty of this. Maybe it’s time that we let go and let God handle the situation.
Choosing to wait doesn’t mean that you don’t care. In fact, waiting coupled with lots of prayers simply means that we are handing things over to the God who is sovereign over whatever it is that we are going through. Like in the story of the bamboo tree, faithfully watering and fertilizing the ground is exactly how we should faithfully pray even when we don’t see any visible results.
How long can you wait for God’s answer to your prayer?
God knows best, and that includes the best timing to give us the best answer to our prayers. It might take hours, days, weeks, months or even years. Sometimes, it’s not even exactly what we were praying for...but it’s God’s best.
As mentioned by author Susan Gale: “The longer you have to wait for something, the more you will appreciate it when it finally arrives.”
So whenever we receive that answer to our prayer, may we utter the sweet words:
“It is absolutely worth the wait.”
Takeaway:
If all you remember from this is one thing, let it be this. That waiting time isn’t necessarily wasted time. Instead, it is us trusting God to work on our behalf and witnessing what He can do even while we wait.
Comments