The Importance of Waiting on God’s Timing

So many of us are waiting for something… We need not underestimate the importance of waiting on God’s timing…

Oh how hard the waiting is.

Sitting in late afternoon sunset as kids skip along sandy shore with sheer delight, my mind wanders. I’m encircled by a million beauties, shells and sun and sparkling sea, yet I can’t keep my thoughts off thinking of her. The missing member.

Here I linger as I wait in the sands of time. And the cruciality of waiting on that perfect timing surrounds me.

The importance of waiting on God’s timing is paramount to the christian walk. Though it’s difficult to wait, there are rewards for those who faithfully wait and trust in Him. We sacrifice the promises of God for our own pathway when we choose to turn and walk our own way.

Our personal unhappy hold-up is a love wait as we yearn for our China adoption to be complete. After years of desiring to add to our family and other failed attempts, we finally locate that sweet missing member, only to have adoption travel shut down.

And those sands just keep pouring.

But many of us wait for something. And it is a common thing to wait for a child – whether it be failed pregnancies, infertility, the adoption waiting game, or something else. I’ve been there. And in fact, so have many of those in the history halls of faith – Abraham and Sarah, Hannah, Elizabeth…

Many people are waiting for a desire fulfilled. You are not alone.

But the waiting isn’t easy and why is that? Why can’t we glide along, like a sailboat in the distance, ever trusting that the wind is blowing us in the right direction while we sip a martini and let the breeze tousle our hair?

Maybe the answer is in the sand.

My digits curl, digging deeper into the coolness beneath. Quartz sand, nearly snow white, like running fingers through a vat of baby powder. Amazing.

Just as amazing is where that sand came from.

Most of it – approximately 25 billion tons – is rock fragments carried by streams into the oceans.

From there, they’re further worn down by water and rock collisions. Some of these rock components dissolve, some pieces end up on the ocean floor. Larger pieces have a harder time of it and settle at the bottom of the ocean, only to be pushed forward with much velocity after a storm. Read about it here.

What’s even more interesting is the trip that rock took before it appeared at the top of a mountain.

Buried deep in the earth as metamorphic rock, the constrained hardness is exposed to high temps and pressure and, eventually, undergoes the melting and refining fire, becoming magma. It crystallizes and cools, becoming igneous rock, showing it’s form on earth’s surface.

Quartz, a primary component of beach sand, is one of the last minerals to form and is especially hard. It’s the toughest and most resistant to chemical weathering.

That’s quite a journey.

The *soft, fine, delectable grains I place perfectly in hand’s palm. They have been through so much to get to be where they are and I rejoice, because these tiny bits comprise the softest sand in the world.

They were purposed to go through their refining process, lengthy as it is, to become the marvel they are today.

And what did they go through?

Intense pressure.
Heat.
A melting and refining fire.
Time.
Then, a shearing away.
A wearing down.
Tossed around, dissolving, a volatile push from a storm.

And time. Lots of time.

His creation sings His praise. Could I not learn something from this? Am I not like a grain of sand myself, held in His own hand?

In the palm of his hand. Etched, ingraved, safely kept for His purposes. {is 49:16}

Yes, his marvelous creation does hold a few answers for us.

Why is it so Hard to Wait on God’s Timing?

God, in His infinite wisdom, has planned the end result in our waiting. Just like the transformation of rock to sand, He sees the slab undergoing it’s imperative pathway of intense pressure and He knows it will one day bear the appearance of delightful, delicate sand. What we know is how terrible it feels in our current situation, the rock undergoing it’s refining. And we wonder how much longer it will be.

In addition, there’s a strain on us because we live in the temporal and God is infinite. We’re constrained by the timeline we keep, but God doesn’t see time like we do. He sees everything, we do not. We can’t come close to fathom the intricate details of why things work out the way they do.

Why is it Important to Wait on God’s Timing?

God does not waste any of our time. All of it is purposeful in refining and molding our hearts for their ultimate purpose. This process is a necessary journey to growing in Him. We will find that our richest growth in life is through the hard times.

God cares about your circumstances. But ultimately, He is most interested in making you more like Him and has already planned to use your circumstances for that preeminent purpose.

What is Sacrificed if you Don’t Wait on God’s Timing?

Not waiting on God’s timing and trying to take things into your own hands is sowing to your flesh. If you sow to your flesh, you’ll reap the flesh.

Abraham and Sarah are a prime example of this. They declined waiting and proceeded to take matters into their own hands, attempting to conceive a child through Hagar {gen 16}. From this segue Ishmael was born – the father of the Arabs, a largely Muslim nation.

Abraham and Sarah had to wait the full length of time God had pre-ordained to have their promised child, Isaac.

I bury my toes, my feet, my ankles in the soft whiteness. I dig in deep.

I know I’m right where I should be. The process, though agonizing at times, is a vital road I must take. And the ending will be good, because He works all things for good for those who love Him and are called according to His purpose {rom 8:28}.

Is He not the One who proclaimed, “I will surely do you good, and make your offspring as the sand of the sea?” He promised millions to Abraham, could He not give me one more? {gen 32:12}

But He can. The key is the span of time from heart’s inception to the blessed gift…

And oh, the importance of the waiting.

Follow along on this journey! This post is the first in a series on waiting and learning to lament in our long suffering call. Read next – just HOW to navigate these tricky waters when we’re asked to wait on God.

*Most beaches are comprised of a mixture of quartz, coral, and other minerals…Siesta Key Beach in Florida is 99% quartz and holds the softest sand in the world. We were blessed to make it a part of our SE USA road trip in 2017.