Good Tuesday morning! Well the excitement of Valentine's Day is over. The deliveries of flowers and candy to various businesses and homes has come to a halt for another year. I wonder if anyone has thought of being the only one to send flowers today, February 15th? Other than those who forgot yesterday entirely that is and must now make up for the lapse. Good news! There is no wind warning for today, perhaps we can enjoy the warm day without holding on to our hats with both hands.
I'm waiting on the Lord this morning for something to write to you. Did you ever 'wait' on the Lord by amusing yourself with a video game, putting on a movie, or grabbing a secular book? Entertaining your mind isn't really waiting on the Lord. We tend to wait by moving our attention over yonder instead of keeping it centered on the Lord. Meditating on the Lord's Word has become a lost art in a world of distraction. In most homes there are several methods of distraction ready at a moment's notice. We hear the command to wait on the Lord, and there is a shelf of books, a television with 100 or more channels, a radio with several stations, a DVD player with a library of movies, and perhaps the biggest distraction of 'em all... the Internet.
The best waiter is going to have plenty of time to wait on your table. He will let it be known to you that he is available and you are at that moment his most important assignment. If you pause for a moment or two while perusing the menu and the waiter pulls out his Blackberry® and starts checking his e-mails, all that work to make you think that you are the most important customer is now useless and the effect is destroyed. You might even be a bit irritated and reduce the tip accordingly. When God tells us to wait, we shouldn't take that as leave to run off and do whatever we want.
By waiting, I don't mean the answer to prayer where God says, "not yet". The waiting that I am writing about today is the waiting in prayer for an answer that God sometimes commands to see if we are really listening to Him, or just rattling off a list of demands. We bring a request to God, and God says "wait!" We bow our heads and listen for the Lord. Our mind doesn't have to be blank, but should be open to hearing the Lord's whisper. The television isn't blaring, the radio isn't rattling off the shelf, and the place where we wait is quiet and peaceful. I have found that God doesn't leave me waiting for long. The answer may be "not yet" to a request of mine and God may desire me to bring the request back to him many times. Other times the answer is "no" and no amount of waiting is going to change God's mind on a matter. What I did realize this morning is that when God says "wait", I often have all manner of distractions that suddenly clamor for attention.
Our minds are active beasts constantly seeking some kind of diversion. We think faster than a person can speak, so we start daydreaming in a meeting. This is of course different than those corporate meetings where people are talking without saying anything. We think faster than we can read so we lose track of our place in the book and have some unrelated thoughts and visions. We have to learn to concentrate on prayer, and then learn to wait sometimes for God to answer. The Lord knows all of the things clamoring for attention in our lives. But how many of those distractions are more important than listening to God?
Thank you Lord for taking the time for each of us, personally. You have an entire universe to run and yet, you are always ready to listen to our prayers. Help us to learn to wait and listen to you, our Lord and Creator.
Bucky
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