Waiting- don’t we all hate it? Waiting in phone queues, at traffic lights, in medical surgeries, at train stations. I just missed my bus. I picked the one department store item that doesn’t have a price tag. The four-lane highway is reduced to one lane due to an accident. This is a time when frustration can build and tempers flare.
Perhaps we can learn something from the wait. For one thing, maybe God allows some minor difficulties to occur in our lives so that we can practise patience and grace. For another, time spent waiting can also be a time spent praying.
Sometimes Christians can turn prayer into a solemn ritual – it needs to happen at a specified time, in a certain place, even to be conducted in a specific manner. There is nothing wrong with these familiar forms of prayer, but I would suggest that waiting can provide an opportunity to pray, not only for yourself and people you know, but also for the people immediately around you.
You can pray without saying words aloud. A heart and thoughts directed to God is all that is needed.
Have you thought about praying for the person in the car in front of you at the red light- particularly if that person was speeding ahead of you before the lights changed? Did you pray for the people involved in the traffic accident and the emergency services attending them as you waited for the lanes to be cleared? As you wait in the doctor’s surgery you could pray for the health, both physical and spiritual, of the people seated around you.
Time is a precious resource and when waiting, we have been given an opportunity to use it for God.
May God bless you as you serve Him.
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