the joy of waiting

My friends will easily attest to the fact that I like answers…and I like answers fast. It’s difficult for me top not be working on a solution if I see that there is a problem…I’m good at being efficient and I’m not one to stand back and watch train wreck happen.

In recent weeks however, I’m realizing that God is asking me to wait. There are some things on my mind that I want answers to…but the more I pray and reflect about it, I realize that it is wiser to let God take His course and I don’t need to be hurrying Him. I keep having that one line from Tina Dico’s “Count to ten” in my head…

The fastest way to get there is to go slow…

It’s particularly hard because I can dream up so many ways to speed up the process…but there’s good reason that patience is one of the fruits of the spirit, right? ;) In thinking about waiting, I also stumbled upon an old comment that a friend offered last December, as a response to my thoughts about Advent. He quotes Bonhoeffer in saying:

The blessedness of waiting is lost on those who cannot wait, and the fulfillment of promise is never theirs. They want quick answers to the deepest questions of life and miss the value of those times of anxious waiting, seeking with patient uncertainties until the answers come. They lose the moment when the answers are revealed in dazzling clarity.