If you find yourself in “waiting mode” more often than you’d like, you’re not alone. Perhaps you’re waiting for some long-held personal or professional hope to be fulfilled. Or for someone else to do something that you think will resolve a problem and make your life better. 

The Bible contains numerous references to waiting, many of which state that it will bring answers, reward, or fruition. In Psalms, for instance, we read, “I waited patiently for the Lord; and he inclined unto me, and heard my cry” (40:1). In Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures and other writings, Mary Baker Eddy indicates that waiting has an important function in our spiritual growth—that it’s not a passive or purposeless activity. For example, she says, “When we wait patiently on God and seek Truth righteously, He directs our path” (Science and Health, p. 254). 

The Bible contains numerous references to waiting, many of which state that it will bring answers, reward, or fruition.

But in an age that often seems to demand instant gratification, waiting might seem difficult, frustrating, or even unfair. After all, “What are you waiting for?” has a dual meaning. The first is the straightforward question. The second is actually a prompt to take action—for instance, a mother might say to her teenager, “What are you waiting for? Go apply for that summer job right now!” This implies that there is no need to wait and that we should move forward in the present moment.

So to determine if our wait has validity, it’s worthwhile to discern what it is we’re really waiting for and why. In many of the Bible passages that mention waiting, there is actually just one object of the wait—God. In reality, we are never waiting for an occurrence or a physical thing. Psalms often refers to waiting on God, as in the verse “Lead me in thy truth, and teach me: for thou art the God of my salvation; on thee do I wait all the day” (25:5). We can be purposeful in our waiting by trusting God and serving Him in humility, though the passage of time is not a factor in our wait, even if it sometimes seems to be.

Fundamental to the understanding of God, good, in Christian Science is the truth that God is All and that as divine Love, God meets our every need. “I nothing lack, for I am His / And He is mine forever” states a hymn in the Christian Science Hymnal, referring to God (Henry W. Baker, No. 330). So if we are waiting for something that we believe we lack, it’s useful to instead be open to waiting on God, who has already supplied the need, though it may not yet have been understood or perceived. 

A biblical example of this can be found in Genesis. The servant Hagar and her child by Abraham have been exiled into the desert with only one bottle of water, which they have consumed. Convinced that they are lacking water, Hagar fears her child will die, believing that waiting to be rescued and supplied with water in the desert is unlikely to bear fruit (see 21:9–19).

But God’s supply is unceasing, and Hagar’s waiting on, or trusting in, God in her time of need literally opened her eyes to a well of water that was near but that she needed to discover: “God opened her eyes, and she saw a well of water; and she went, and filled the bottle with water, and gave the lad drink.” So the need was not for someone to bring more water, but for Hagar to have the God-impelled awareness to see the already-existing supply. 

In my study of Christian Science, I’ve learned that when a lack is apparent, the best solution comes from being willing to pause and wait on God for inspired discernment of the fact that everything truly needed is at hand. This approach has always brought better results than hurriedly embarking on a course of action to try to fill a need. If Hagar had suddenly started searching for water, she might have missed that well that was right at hand.

I’ve found that sometimes hoped-for progress seems delayed and the wait for it long or difficult. But through waiting or leaning on God, progress does unfold, and sometimes it even becomes evident that the delay was necessary. At other times I have come to see that what I felt I was waiting for was ultimately not the right outcome, and what was truly best became clear. Science and Health says: “Beholding the infinite tasks of truth, we pause,—wait on God. Then we push onward, until boundless thought walks enraptured, and conception unconfined is winged to reach the divine glory” (p. 323). 

Our Father-Mother God supplies all that is good for every one of us. Eddy assures us that “. . . it is enough that divine Love is an ever-present help; and if you wait, never doubting, you will have all you need every moment” (Miscellaneous Writings 1883–1896, p. 307).

That is the kind of God-derived security worth waiting for.