Don’t Wait by Yourself
Waiting Is Relational
Every Christian is waiting.
Most of us consider this reality from a personal vantage point. We individualize it. Perhaps there’s something in your life that you desire, but it’s been delayed. Or maybe there are painful circumstances that you long to see resolved, but you’re living in tension.
Gaining personal perspective by embracing a different attitude about waiting is a good starting point. It’s where my journey began. I sensed a deep longing to grow in my understanding of waiting on God. I’ve grown in my appreciation of this biblical practice, and I’m more convinced than ever that waiting on God is essential for my spiritual growth.
A Collective Vision
Eventually I realized that I wasn’t thinking broadly enough. I discovered something that I didn’t consider at the beginning of my journey: Christians wait on God together. There’s something collective about waiting. Whether we realize it or not, we’re all waiting on God. At some level, every Christian is in the same position. While there may be different circumstances, intensities, or challenges, every Christian is presently living in some “gap land.” Waiting on God is the biblical and transformative baseline for the entire church. As a result, there’s an opportunity to help each other as we wait. Andrew Murray stokes the fire of this vision when he writes:
Oh! what will not the Church be able to do when her individual members learn to live their lives waiting on God, and when together, with all of self and the world sacrificed in the fire of love, they unite in waiting with one accord for the promise of the Father, once so gloriously fulfilled, but still unexhausted.1
One way we waste our waiting is by not realizing that God invites us to pursue it with other people, to integrate waiting into the normal life of the body of Christ.
We need to wait on God together.
Waiting Isn't a Waste
Mark Vroegop
In Waiting Isn’t a Waste, author Mark Vroegop explores 6 characteristics of waiting, calling believers to lean on Christ when we are uncertain about our lives, but certain about God.
The Church Began by Waiting
Let’s start with the birth of the church.
After the resurrection, one of Jesus’s earliest commands to his disciples was for them to wait. However, it’s easy to miss this simple truth and its importance. Yet this is the context in which the church began and the Spirit was poured out. In Acts 1:3–5, Luke records these instructions from Jesus:
He presented himself alive to them after his suffering by many proofs, appearing to them during forty days and speaking about the kingdom of God. And while staying with them he ordered them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father, which, he said, “you heard from me; for John baptized with water, but you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit not many days from now.” (Acts 1:3–5)
Take note that Jesus commanded the disciples to wait. Can you imagine the tension? They must have been alarmed, wondering if Roman or Jewish leaders were looking for them. Yet their first orders from the resurrected Messiah were to wait and not flee the danger. Apparently the disciples weren’t thrilled with this instruction because they inquired about the next steps in the plan of God. Jesus rather bluntly redirected their question and reframed their future role:
He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” (Acts 1:7–8)
Just think about these two texts. Uncertainty, tension, and waiting are how the church began. Forty days later as the disciples were waiting together, the Holy Spirit arrived with flames of fire over their heads. They began to speak in other tongues (Acts 2:4). Peter preached his famous sermon when about three thousand people were converted (Acts 2:41). You may be familiar with this story. It’s the amazing launch of the church.
But there was also a lot of waiting.
One way we waste our waiting is by not realizing that God invites us to pursue it with other people, to integrate waiting into the normal life of the body of Christ. We need to wait on God together.
I wonder how many Christians think about the mission of the church in this way. If you just read the Great Commission in Matthew 28, it sounds active: “Go . . . make disciples, baptizing them . . . teaching them to observe” (Matt. 28:19–20). But this mission activity also involves a lot of waiting on God. It practically looks like this: wait and go and wait and go. Waiting on God is vital to the mission of God. Waiting is how the church began!
The Church Continued to Wait
Miraculous power and fruitfulness characterized the early church. Reading the book of Acts, we get a sense of the activity, progress, and even the opposition. But we shouldn’t miss the critical moments of waiting. Here are a few examples:
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After Peter and John’s arrest and being threatened by the religious leaders, the church waited together, praying for wisdom, protection, and empowerment. (Acts 4:23–31)
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Jesus appeared to Saul on the Damascus road and told him, “Rise and enter the city, and you will be told what you are to do.” He waited three days for the arrival of Ananias and the recovery of his sight. (Acts 9:6–19)
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When Peter was imprisoned by Herod during the Passover, the church waited with earnest prayer to God, and it’s the first place Peter visits after his miraculous release. (Acts 12:1–19)
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During Paul and Silas’s imprisonment in Philippi, they turned their jail cell into a place of worship while they waited for God’s miraculous deliverance. (Acts 16:16–34)
It’s instructive that many memorable moments of the early church are connected to waiting on God. We tend to focus on the activity and advancement of the gospel, but it’s important to remember the context of tension-filled gaps. Seeking God in the middle of uncertainty is a familiar theme for those who embrace the call of God. As I look at the landscape of Christianity and the activity of the church, I don’t see a lot of emphasis on waiting. Instead there’s a high premium placed on action, movement, growth, and expansion. Don’t get me wrong—I heartily believe in the Great Commission and evangelism. Seeing the kingdom of God advance and the hearts of people change brings me incredible joy. But I wonder if our individual struggle with waiting is partly because it’s unfamiliar in the regular life of the church.
Waiting isn’t just essential for Christians; it’s essential for the entire church in every generation.
Notes:
- Andrew Murray, Waiting on God! Daily Messages for a Month (New York: Revell, 1896), 138.
This article is adapted from Waiting Isn’t a Waste: The Surprising Comfort of Trusting God in the Uncertainties of Life by Mark Vroegop.
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