Teach Me to Wait

“What are you waiting for?” I hear that question asked a lot in life. It’s a good one to ask people who are afraid to move forward, even when the road ahead is clear. It’s also one we should ask ourselves when we get stuck in a stale routine that desperately needs change.

It’s even a question I hear my wife ask the car in front of her when the light turns green but they just sit there.

But perhaps a better question is the one David answered in Psalm 25:5 — Who are you waiting for? David’s answer is simple: “On Thee do I wait all the day.” He wasn’t just waiting for a change of circumstances; he was waiting on the Lord Himself.

Most of us can barely wait a minute. I see it every day at the office microwave as people impatiently drum their fingers, muttering “C’mon, hurry up…” while staring daggers at their spinning Hot Pockets and Pizza Rolls.

Faith, I’m learning, is an endurance game—because faith inherently involves waiting. We pray and wait. We obey and wait. And David’s waiting was like a student in class, sitting quietly for the next lesson from the Teacher.

My wife had to scold a few of her students last week because they skipped ahead in their workbooks. “That lesson is for later,” she told them. “You need to wait.”

Spiritually speaking, some of us are still on Lesson One while others are racing ahead. Some of us are trying to rush the Teacher. But real growth takes time. Some lessons last a lifetime; others are over in a moment.

Always be willing to wait longer—even until death. That may sound extreme, but if we believe the Lord is teaching the lesson, then the answers are worth waiting forever to learn. A willingness to wait for anything is one of the greatest ways to learn patience.