Willing Waiting

Do you recall the routine when you go for your doctor’s appointment?  Entering the waiting room you are instructed to sign-in. After that then the person behind the counter says; “Please have a seat. We will be with you shortly.”

Protocols are a part of life. We face them every day in one form or another. From security checkpoints to reception areas, standards and procedures are in operation to screen callers, clients or visitors. This is not only for protection. It is also to help ensure that people with legitimate business get where they need to go and that others are either redirected or turned away.

Worship is also protocol. It is the protocol that protects the King, it is also the protocol that qualifies the visitor. Remember that worship is based on relationship. In Jesus' parable of the wedding (Matthew 22:1-14), the king spots a guest who has no wedding garment. The wedding garment was a sign of relationship. It was proof that the guest had been invited and had the right to be there. Somehow an intruder had gotten inside. A “wedding-crasher” had invaded the party. When he was unable to answer the king's challenge, he was evicted. Relationship gives us the right of access to the King. Worship is the garment that gets us through the door.

Part of the protocol for qualifying guests is the protocol of waiting. Many of us don't handle waiting very well. This is especially true when we have been praying for something for a while and God seems to be silent. Our fast-paced, microwave-speed, instant-everything society has conditioned us to expect immediate gratification of our desires. Sometimes God lets us wait so that we can learn patience. At other times He delays His answer because He is preparing to give us something better.

Waiting on the Lord rearranges our priorities and reorients our perspective to those of the King. It also gauges how hungry we are for Him. Many would-be guests to the King's presence disqualify themselves by being unwilling to wait. If their request for an audience is not answered promptly, they leave. They're either too busy or not hungry enough to hang around. And so they miss their opportunity. When their turn finally comes, they are already gone.
 
Don't let impatience cause you to forfeit your opportunity to see the King. Content yourself with waiting on Him. If you wait long enough your patience will be well rewarded. You will be drawn into an intimacy with the King that is experienced by very few.

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