There has been a topic swirling around in my head for days now... the whole concept of waiting upon the Lord... (not waiting on Him for anything in particular just waiting upon Him) now its in regards to a message I'll be speaking however my husband and I wondered if the Lord was simply teaching me to wait upon Him and do all this thinking and praying and processing only at the end of it to have learned what it is to wait upon Him and so then truly have the message ... and it not even be about waiting ...
I guess we will see...
But I'll tell you this.. I have wanted to come at this topic honestly.. I don't want to stand in front of people and ever say something off the cuff even if it is truth.. it is important for me to be authentic and transparent and as I heard the phrase, "wait upon the Lord..." a knot formed in the pit of my stomach...
Sure I could pull forth the scriptures about strength being renewed and all the marvelous things that the psalms speak of when one considers the person who waits upon the Lord and what indeed he or she is waiting for....
But as I thought about the topic and it landed time and time again upon my person I was brought to this place where I had to come face to face with the lack of trust I had in this area and the dread of waiting upon the Lord that existed within me....
What if I wait upon the Lord and His timing is not my timing and I lack perseverance to stay the course... what if I wait upon the Lord and nothing happens... how will I deal with the discrepancy between what I think something says or means and the truth of it..
I saw in the core of my gut this reaction that didn't surprise me but startled me how deep it went... this feeling of fear in regards to what if I wait and nothing happens.... or even what if I wait and the opposite to what I hoped would happen happens.... oh sure... sure.. I can speak forth all the cover ups... talk about timing and faith and how we just don't always know why something doesn't happen the way we even thought we heard God say it would.... and I can self speak and express how well maybe I heard it wrong or maybe it was just me... etc etc etc.....
As I journeyed through the whole issue many things came forward... first the realization that I don't always open myself up or actually let me be honest I have almost thoroughly closed off aspects to hearing from God because of fear... fear of being wrong... of not getting it right.. of hearing something and then having to struggle with the whole how will it happen or when will it happen etc etc etc....
I realized I have cut myself off from hearing God in some areas because I don't want to be disappointed again.. I don't trust myself in those areas to hear rightly and so I don't want to hear at all.. and yet even as I write I can feel what that has truly done to me and the sadness of it lingers... Oh Lord bring your perfect love here to this place and wash away the fear and residue of concern and bring forth within me the heart to hear all that you have to say... regardless of cost to my person... I do repent for pushing you out of this place in my life and I hunger for You and Your ways to step into this place and I speak forth that I am willing to hear all that You have to share even if in the course of that happening I face being wrong.. being wrong would be better than cutting you off... forgive me dearest Father and heal my heart....
Pray that with me if there are aspects in your heart that resonate...
And then comes the flesh... I think my soul is afflicted in the areas of hope and my heart and my mind wage war against what my spirit knows to be true... But then comes the flesh and I live in a culture that wants what they want and they want it now.. and waiting .. waiting in an era where at the drop of a second I have so much at the tip of my fingers.. waiting seems to be a lost art....
Now here is where reality stepped in and I say reality because the most real aspect of my life is Him... and after battling with all the emotions and all the desires of my flesh ... I began to know in that same place.. in my gut that had been so tied in knots.... that I do not wait as one who has no hope... that my hope is assured... because I wait upon the Lord...
And then the issue of trust came flying forward... and how thoroughly do I trust Him .. how thoroughly do I trust Him to lead me... to guide me... knowing that I get it wrong... knowing that I don't understand His ways as I would hunger and yearn to want to.... How thoroughly do I trust Him as I am called to trust... the whole trust in the Lord with all your strength.. (hhhhhmmmm ... all my strength) and lean not onto my own understanding but in all my ways acknowledge Him and He will direct my path.... Do I trust Him??? Do I trust Him? Do I trust Him with all my strength? Do I lean upon Him and not upon my own understanding of even myself?
If I believe that He is truly indeed who He is and do not doubt then this is possible... but what I saw within myself as I danced with the formation of this message is that doubt lingered in places in my heart where pain from past disappointments and failures or places of confusion existed... that I did doubt...
Was it the faithfulness of God that I was doubting? Was it my capacity to truly know Him that I was concerned about? Was I afraid of just getting it so wrong and not knowing what it was I thought I knew?
And then the reality of I need to know God in this area... I truly need to know God in this area all the more... and I'm not willing to pay it lip service... this doubt or fear that exists within me ... is there... and while confession of the truth and His word eases the discomfort I find myself back at the beginning... I must truly wait upon the Lord... I must wait upon Him to bring forth His healing ...
I walk with Him.. I know Him... I love Him .... and yet in this place in my heart my knowledge of Him is faulty.. not Him faulty... but my knowledge of Him in this place... and He desires for me to be whole.... I am asking for bread and I do have courage to believe that He will not give me a stone... I don't know what it will look like but I know I must venture there....
A friend shared a story of children who were adopted and brought over to this country from Africa.... in a day's time they went from a small orphanage in a tiny village to a major metropolitan airport.... and they say an escalator for the first time in their lives.....
I haven't walked this way before there are places that I know I am to walk into but I don't know how.... places of knowing Him that are so foreign to me and all my experiences that I have no grid to even place them upon... But in this place I make the decision to lean not on my own understanding or that which the world would tell me... I decide not to listen to the scream within my soul nor my flesh... I hunger for truth in the innermost places and because of that He has touched this place... and so I sit... I sit and I wait upon the Lord.....
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