Maintaining Your Faith: How to Wait on God
What are your dreams?
If you were ten-years-old again and someone asked you what you wanted to be—anything at all—and you knew without a doubt that you become it, what would you be? What path would you choose?
As I get older, I notice that many people are working jobs they don’t exactly love, making salaries they wish were different, and are even married to people they could live without. How many astronauts, models, psychologists, and even actors have given up on their dreams? Not just in the world, but in the Body of Christ?
I hear many people walking around saying they want to be used by God, they want the Lord to bring purpose into their life. But as common as it is for people to say they want to be used by God, its just as common for others—or sometimes those same people—to turn around and also say that God is taking too long, where is the Lord, or why do I have to wait?
When I was younger I used to be the exact same way; I would walk around saying I want to be something big, something awesome—I know the Lord is going to bless me, I know I have His favor to help me spread the Gospel. But after time passed and, in my own natural eyes, I felt that nothing was happening, I would give up and turn my back on the Lord.
Its easy for us to blame God when we are desperate. We think we’ve done everything right; we’re praying every day, reading our Bible every day, fasting, meditating, everything that we can think of—yet our blessings and our dreams have not manifest. So we blame God. He’s taking too long, He’s not listening to me, etc etc.
Have you ever stopped to do a bit of self-reflection?
Even if you are praying, fasting, and reading your Bible—having the mindset that God owes you something is not the right attitude. Consider this scripture from Romans 4:4-5 NIV:
Now to the one who works, wages are not credited as a gift but as an obligation. However, to the one who does not work but trusts God who justifies the ungodly, their faith is credited as righteousness.
When you think that you deserve to be blessed because you have been a good Christian, you are functioning under the Law of Moses—not under God’s grace which rewards us for simply being righteous. You cannot earn blessings from God; they are gifts given to us out of love—not something that we can work for from reading and praying and fasting. Trusting and believing is all you must do to inherit your blessings.
Never give up on the Lord, my friend. It might be tempting to look at your situation from the natural: the doctor’s report, the piles of bills in the mail, the lack in your life—but looking at the natural is exactly where you mess up. We are not natural beings serving a natural God; we are spirit first, then soul, then body [see I Thessalonians 5:23]—serving a spiritual God. So, our eyes must not focus on what is seen but on what is unseen [see II Corinthians 4:18].
This is the month of April—remember the saying: April showers brings May flowers. Think of this saying whenever you feel upset or impatient with your surroundings, it is very reminiscent of the scripture from Psalm 30:5 NIV “…Weeping may stay for a night but rejoicing comes in the morning.”
No matter what you are facing, it will not stay that way forever. God sees you; He knows exactly where you are right now and despite all the chaos that surrounds you, He has you in the palm of His hand. The negativity you are in right now will soon turn to joy and celebration; just hold on and never give up, never stop believing that God is moving in your favor each and every day and in each and every way.
God bless.