Article May 5, 1997 Issue

How to do better waiting

Katherine Hildreth

Are you ever frustrated by having to wait around for somebody else to do something before you can get on with your own work? It's possible to get rid of this frustration—by doing a better job of waiting! I don't mean a waiting that's impatient, standing still, resenting what appears to have put us in a bind with no way to move. But a waiting that's full of spiritual growth and promise.

When we approach waiting in the spiritual sense of waiting on God—serving Him, being His image—we don't fall into the trap of thinking someone else has to do something, or some material thing has to happen, before our own identity can come clearly into focus and we can get on with life. In reality we are complete, full of life and vitality right now—perfect—because God makes us that way. Our true life never comes to a standstill.

Christ Jesus certainly didn't wait for life to get better. The waiting he did was to wait on—serve—God. He told his disciples: "My meat is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his work. Say not ye, There are yet four months, and then cometh harvest? behold, I say unto you, Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields; for they are white already to harvest" (John 4:34, 35).

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