Waiting...

Those that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength
They shall rise up with wings as eagles
They shall run and not get weary
They shall walk and not grow faint
Teach me Lord to wait
(Isaiah 40:31)

Was on a hike yesterday.  15 kilometers, up and down.  By the time we were a kilometer or two from the parking lot, my knees ached, my hips were screaming and my feet were protesting.   Upon realization on how old and broken down I sometimes feel at the grand ole age of 51, the scripture about waiting on the Lord popped into the head...actually, it was the walking and not fainting part that popped in...and then I started to ponder it.

Here's what I got...

Have you ever received a promise?  A certainty from God concerning a plan, or destiny, or much hoped for answer to prayer?  I have.  In 1998 God promised me that He had and was preserving my marriage for a purpose and that it was good to wait for the salvation of the Lord.  But the actual manifestation of a preserved and redeemed marriage did not actually come to sprout until 2010 and is still in the beginnings of the bear fruit stage.  Sometimes waiting on promises is hard...because sometimes promises are a long time coming.  Yet, when they begin to unfold, looking back on the waiting, it never seems so bad.  But sometimes, just before the promise arrives, things seem very dark and dreary indeed.

In contrast, when we first receive the promise it's exciting, so hopeful, and with great faith and enthusiasm, we pour all our energy into preparing for it.  We rise up with wings as eagles, taking flight, so certain that  the promise will come to fruition very soon, in fact,  just around the corner soon.   Certainly, within the time span that we're able to sustain the loftiness of high emotions that accompany promises from God.

After a while though, it becomes evident that the promise isn't coming as quickly as we thought.  We can no longer sustain the energy of full flight, but we still have enough expectant energy, full of the certainty of faith,  to run.   Doubt has not caused us to stumble yet.  We're not yet weary of the waiting.  So now we run.

But alas, after a while, sometimes what seems a very long while, we get tired.  The weariness of waiting on the promise is beginning to sap our strength.  The excitement has dulled. Doubt is setting in.  Nevertheless, we know we have to continue to wait, even for the renewing of our strength, it seems.  So, now we're walking.  And because the waiting has renewed our strength, we're able to walk without fainting.  But the walking part is the hardest.  We're the furthest removed from when we first received the promise, when we had all the enthusiasm and energy needed to soar into it, even if that soaring later became running.  Now though, the promise feels like a distant memory, and we're beginning to wonder if we even heard it right in the first place. Maybe we misunderstood.  Perhaps we got it all wrong.  Was there a promise after all?  

The Hebrew word for faint literally means "deprived of life"....as in,  "shall walk and not be deprived of life". 

The things that have the potential to deprive me of life are things that trigger feelings of hopelessness and despair - like betrayal or broken promises.   But God never breaks His promises, though, He will require that we wait for them, with the promise to renew our strength so we can keep on waiting for them.

I think that in every waiting walk, we come to a fork in a road where we are faced with a choice to walk and not faint or faint and stop walking.

If we just keep on walking, knowing that while we walk, we also wait, that waiting on the Lord renews our strength, so that maybe this time when the spark of enthusiasm and joy revives us to rise up with wings as eagles, its because we're celebrating the arrival of the promise.

They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength
They shall rise up with wings as eagles
They shall run and not get weary
They shall walk and not faint
Teach me Lord to wait.