We’ve been chatting over the last few days about learning to be joyful in the midst of life’s heart aches. If you missed the last conversations they can be found here:
We finished last time by saying… grieving doesn’t last forever; But it can hold up our next step to joy or happiness in the heart attack if we don’t give it voice. That next step is:…
In the midst of life’s heart attacks Go back to what you know and wait patiently for God.
John 21:1-3 Afterward Jesus appeared again to his disciples, by the Sea of Galilee. It happened this way: 2 Simon Peter, Thomas (also known as Didymus), Nathanael from Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two other disciples were together. 3 “I’m going out to fish,” Simon Peter told them, and they said, “We’ll go with you.” So they went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing.
Many people criticize Peter for going back to fishing after Jesus resurrection. Some think it was a sign that he was going back to his old life. I don’t. I think Peter was simply at loose ends. Jesus had risen from the dead, but what did that mean? What was Peter supposed to do with that knowledge? He didn’t know. So I think he simply went back to doing what was available what he knew while he waited for God. This is good advice. So many of us go through a bad spot in life and the first thing we do is change everything. We start making major life decisions before we have grieved or before we have sought God for His direction.
Charles Spurgeon said, “Stand still- keep the posture of an upright man, ready for action expecting further orders, cheerfully and patiently, awaiting the directing voice; and it will not be long ere God shall say to you as distinctly as Moses said it to the people of Israel, ‘Go forward.’ If the Lord Jehovah makes us wait, let us do so with our whole hearts; for blessed are all they that wait for Him. He is worth waiting for. The waiting itself is beneficial to us; it tries faith, exercises patience, trains submission, and endears the blessing when it comes. The Lord’s people have always been a waiting people.”
And John Ortberg says this about waiting for God. “Biblically waiting is not just something we have to do until we get what we want. Waiting is part of the process of becoming what God wants us to be.”
Waiting is not just doing nothing while we are hanging around for the God bus to show up. Biblical waiting is continuing in what we know to do until God shows us what we don’t know how to do. It is continuing in what we know even though we know that the continuing is not the answer. It is continuing in what we know because that is all we have of faithfulness to God and because waiting will always eventually lead us to step three in becoming happy in the heart attack which is… See you tomorrow.
Lillie-Put 
I always love to learn about waiting and these quotes were good, along with the post! God bless you!
Thanks Deb! Waiting is perhaps one of the most productive and difficult things we Christians can do!
For a workaholic waiting can be difficult – until we find that waiting on God enables us to achieve much more.
I have found much the same thing. In my waiting God multiplies my effectiveness.