Can anyone remember life before the internet?
I can remember a time when images on the screen would appear over a period of time, they would often be revealed line by line because the connection was so slow.
We now expect an instant response, instant action, because we live in an instant world.
Amazon can deliver in 2 hours or less using…what else: Amazon Prime NOW!
Communication with each other can be instant, WhatsApp lets us communicate en-mass so our phones constantly ping with declarations of “I’m here, I care, I’m listening, you deserve a response”
Our desire for fast can sneak into our faith and our prayers. We pray and wait, pray and wait, wondering why we haven’t heard the ‘ping’ of a response from God.
God can and does move quickly, in a moment he can heal, inspire a spontaneous sermon, change a life…..but more often than not we wonder how long…how long God. Surely he’s not asleep, not on holiday, not sat on his hands, surely not…and yet it feels like it sometimes especially when years pass and nothing changes.
We may live in an instant world that celebrates God’s instant responses but God does not value the things this world values…sometimes his glory is best displayed when he moves slowly.
God most times works like we would cooking a good brisket joint….he would never microwave it….he would always marinate it and cook it slowly allowing the juices to flow and to develop strength and taste.
There are many in the bible who experienced God moving slowly in their circumstances.
Abraham waited 25 years after God had promised the birth of Isaac and while Abraham was waiting, God was working; moulding his character and teaching him patience, Abraham got to know God intimately in his waiting, Abraham was transformed.
David had a 15-year wait while God marinated him into a King. He learned to be a leader by leading single-minded sheep where they did not want to go and he learned to worship unrestricted, removing all outer signs of his own importance to worship the one who was important to him. David had to wait 15 years for God to marinade him into a King fit to lead Israel.
Joseph had a dream that cost him his freedom for nearly 14 years, his vision was slow to be fulfilled but the purpose of waiting was to develop him into a man who learned, a man who depended and trusted God despite his adverse situation because God was going to use this slave to save his family and a nation.
Most of the time we hold on to our own idea of God's promises because we sometimes want immediate, fast-moving, emotionally powerful experiences.
There is an old Yiddish proverb that says “We plan, God laughs” now I don’t think God waits for us to plan something and then peevishly puts a stop to it but I do think that we have ideas, especially when we are younger of what we want to accomplish, we have ideas of what we think God wants us to accomplish…and we want to accomplish that NOW…but like Abraham, David and Joseph we’re simply not ready
None of us have received everything we planned for, the partners we dreamed of, the job we studied for, the good health we thought was ours for ever, the children we talked about or even the country we wanted to live in, for some of us this is simply not the life we had planned, God has not microwaved an answer for us BUT we have the same assurance that Abraham and David and Joseph did — that God will provide everything we need. As we let that promise sink in, we can see our waiting differently.
With God is not about what we get and what we become after God has made us wait and worked on us but who we become in that waiting. Perhaps God is making us wait for the same reasons that he made Abraham, David and Joseph wait; to forge our faith, to make us attentive to his Word, to deepen our relationship, to solidify our trust, to prepare us for ministry, to make us teachable, to transform us into his likeness…..never underestimate what God can do in a lifetime of waiting.
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