Living Humbly Means Waiting On God part 1

"What's taking so long?" We have all said it countless times in a wide variety of situations. We are an impatient people. We don't like waiting. We want what we want, and we want it now. Sometimes our impatience is a negative thing. We rush and rush until life is no fun. Other times, we are eager to get to some good thing ahead of us. Often our impatience is directed at God. We want the good things He promised us, or we want Him to intervene and stop some evil and we wonder what is taking so long. "How long, O Lord?" is an expression found in numerous places throughout the Old and New Testaments (Psalm 6:3, 13:1, 35:17, 79:5, 80:4, 94:3; Habakkuk 1:2; Zechariah 1:12; Revelation 6:10). We wonder what God is up to. We wonder why He isn't doing something now. Surely if God was going to intervene, now would be a great time. Sometimes when we become impatient with God or a situation, we are tempted to doubt God or to try to do His job for Him. But God's timing is not like ours. So, learning to wait on God is an essential aspect of following Him. Psalm 40 starts off with "I waited patiently for the Lord..." In 1 Thessalonians 1:9-10, Paul describes the faith of the new Christians he was writing to in this way, "and you turned to God from idols to serve a living and true God, and to wait for His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, that is Jesus, who rescues us from the wrath to come." The three dimensions of following God: turn...serve...wait. It should be no wonder that James addresses this subject as well. Waiting on God is another dimension of living humbly. If we are going to let God be God, then we have to learn that He won't do things like we want or expect Him to. So as James draws his book to a close, he gives in one of his last lessons a helpful guide for learning to wait on God. Trust God's Timing, vs 7 The first step in learning to wait on God is to trust His timing. Sometimes we think we know all the answers and see all the variables. We think God needs to speed up and catch up to us. Waiting on God doesn't mean God is somehow late or running behind. It means we don't know all the variables and don't have all the answers. That is why waiting on God is an aspect of humility. In 2 Peter 3:8-9, Peter writes "But do not let this one fact escape your notice, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years like one day. The Lord is not slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance." God doesn't calculate time like we do. He also doesn't drag His feet in fulfilling His promises. In fact, Peter says God is actually waiting on us. He "is patient toward you." One of the reasons God waits is because He is at work in us to produce something that needs time to grow. That is why James uses a farming metaphor. The produce can't grow until it receives both the early and the late rains. The farmer can't rush growth. It takes a while for them to get everything they need to grow to maturity. The same is true for God. He is doing something, it can't be rushed, we have to learn to trust His timing. Peter makes a similar point in 1 Peter 5:6, "Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you at the proper time." The word translated here as "Proper time" is the Greek word "kairos." The Greeks had two words for time: chronos, which means the sequence of time; and kairos, which means the right time for something. God knows the right time for things. He isn't slow. He is wise, and He calls us to be humble and trust His timing. Be on the Alert, vs 8 James next encourages us to be ready at any moment for the Lord to return. He means both the second coming but also all those ways that God reemerges into our lives after a period of apparent absence. This isn't supposed to be about sitting around nervously anticipating someone to barge through the door. We also aren't supposed to live as if Jesus will never come back. We are supposed to be focused on doing what we are supposed to be doing, okay if He comes back now or a long time from now. In Matthew 14:42-51, Jesus told a series of parables about what this kind of waiting looks like: "Therefore, be on the alert, for you do not know which day your Lord is coming. But be sure of this, that if the head of the house had known at what time of the night the thief was coming, he would have been on the alert and would not have allowed his house to be broken into. For this reason, you also must be ready; for the Son of Man is coming at an hour when you do not think He will. Who then is the faithful and sensible slave whom his master put in charge of his household to give them their food at the proper time? Blessed is that slave whom his master finds so doing when he comes. Truly I say to you that he will put him in charge of all his possessions. But if that evil slave says in his heart, 'My master is not coming for a long time,' and begins to beat his fellow slaves and eat and drink with drunkards; the master of that slave will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour which he does not know, and will cut him in pieces and assign him a place with the hypocrites; in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth." This applies to the final return of Jesus. It also applies to the intervention of God in our lives. Like a solider left it charge of a frontier fort, we are supposed to be following the orders we were given until we receive new orders or our commander shows up. That requires us to be ready always. Such an attitude requires us to realize that the road God puts us on is one that requires endurance. You don't run an endurance race by focusing on the distance. That is how you handle a sprint. If you thought the race you were running was a sprint and it turned into a marathon, you would be heartbroken. Endurance running requires you to simply focus on taking one more step, never quitting, and watching your form. Even big problems might not hurt you over a short distance. But over a long distance, tiny problems can become huge issues. Don't Complain, vs 9 James tells us the next step in learning to wait on God is not to complain. Waiting on God always makes us wonder. It can leave us confused. We often become frustrated. We can be tempted to lament the path we are on, especially when we see someone else's road going smoother than ours. We look for something we can change. What ends up happening is that we look for someone to blame. James tells us waiting can lead to grumbling. When we find ourselves tempted to complain or grumble, we can return to some of the lessons James has already been trying to teach us about speech and what it reveals. Most of all, we can focus on the good in every situation, focus on God reminding ourselves of His faithfulness, and focus on relying on Jesus instead of ourselves. When we do that, our complaining will turn into praise as we live out Philippians 4:13, "I can do all things through Him who strengthens me." Remember, this passage doesn't mean I can do impossible things, it means I can endure any circumstance not because I have what it takes or know what to do, but because Jesus promises to give me his mercy and grace to help in every time of need. Imitate Worthy Examples, vs 10-11 James then tells us that in order to wait well, we need to have good models and worthy examples to follow. Every time we are forced to wait on God, we start thinking we have been forgotten or abandoned. We wonder if we did something wrong. The life and example of people who have gone through similar things will help us see the way forward by looking at how God remained faithful in other people's lives. James specifically mentions the prophets and Job, who serve as paradigms of suffering, patience, and endurance; people who felt the same things as we do when they were in the midst of hard times. But the difference is that we can read the end of their story, and we can see the way God worked things out for their good and His glory. Such examples can serve as powerful motivators to help us trust that God is able to bring our lives to fulfillment as well. We will be able to run our race better if we are inspired by the races other people have run. "Since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us." (Hebrews 12:1) Trusts God's Heart, v. 11 Earlier James told us that trusting God's timing was essential for learning to wait well. Now he tells us we also need to trust God's heart as well. A psychologist once said that we all read our own insecurities into other people's silences. We also end up doing that with God. When we don't see God move in our lives, we can suddenly start to fill the void with our worst fears. With God it can often revolve around who God is or who we are. Perhaps we think God is mad at us, or that we have failed, or He has forgotten us. This is one of the reasons we need to have good theology, which is just a fancy way of saying we need accurate thoughts about God, so that when hard times hit, we fill the void with the truth not our fears. James says we need to remember that the Lord is "full of compassion and is merciful." These two truths are some of the first that we forget. God made us; he knows our weaknesses. Psalm 103:14 says, "For He Himself knows our frame; He is mindful that we are but dust." And this knowledge moves God to love us and fill up what is lacking in us. Hebrews 4:15-16 sums this up perfectly: "We do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. Therefore, let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need." He knows our weaknesses and is strong to help. He loves giving us mercy to cover our failings and grace to fill up our weaknesses. And he loves us, so he invites us to come with confidence to get it from him. Conclusion Waiting for anything is hard. Waiting for God is perhaps the hardest. How we wait will reveal a lot about who we are. Learning to wait on God is essential if we want to become who He created us to be. When God moves you into a period of waiting, remember that He isn't passive, nor has he forgotten you, nor is he angry at you. Keep yourself from complaining. Stay alert. Follow good examples. Above all, remember you can trust God's timing and His heart. 2 Living Humbly Means Waiting on God - James 5:7-11