Is God glorified by how I'm waiting?
Before I
begin, I need this perspective:
Proverbs 3:5-8
“5 Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding.
6 In all your ways acknowledge him,
and he will make straight your paths.
7 Be not wise in your own eyes;
fear the LORD, and turn away from evil.
8 It will be healing to your flesh and refreshment to your bones.”
The topic of
waiting is not a fun topic no matter the significance of the wait.
We wait for trivial
or insignificant things. We wait in line at the grocery story (constantly
contemplating if we should have chosen a different line, comparing ourselves to
the people in other lines who have moved ahead faster than us…no fair!). We
wait at the red light. We wait for someone to reply to an email or text
message. We wait for the coffee to finish brewing. We wait for our kids to fall
asleep so we can finally rest. We wait for our check to go through so we can
buy groceries and pay bills. We wait for the water to get hot enough to take a
shower. We wait for the next episode of our favorite show to come out. We wait
for our name to be called at the dentist’s office.
We also wait
for bigger, more meaningful things. We wait for college acceptance letter. We
wait for graduation day. We wait to meet our future spouse. We wait for him to
pop the question. We wait to get pregnant. We wait for the birth of our child.
We wait for the potential relieving or devastating news from the doctor. We
wait for a job offer from our recent interview. We wait for our house offer to
be accepted. We wait for our children to come to saving faith in the Lord. We
wait for our church to find a pastor. We wait for a loved one to return home. We
wait for reconciliation in a broken relationship. We wait for our husband to
find a job. We wait and wait and wait. Sometimes the waiting is for just a
short time, while other waits may be much longer. But in many seasons of waiting
for things that are heavy on our hearts and minds, the wait is anything but
easy.
Due to recent
conversations between Patrick and me, I have been challenged to evaluate how
well I’m doing in the waiting process. It’s not a fun evaluation, but it has been
necessary and fruitful. We have been in a long season of waiting. Waiting for a
second child. Waiting to finally get pregnant again. Waiting for Riley Grace to
be able to have a sibling that she so desperately longs for. And truthfully, I
have not done a very good job with this season that God has allowed me to be in
for quite some time. This September, Riley Grace will be 6, I will be 32, and I
honestly wanted to have at least one more child by this time in my life. That
was my plan. That has been my heart’s deepest desire for over three
years now. At this point in our journey, it hasn’t been a matter of not being able to
get pregnant, but simply not being at a place where we felt like God was
prompting us to “try.” Patrick and I have had numerous tearful conversations
and heart-wrenching prayers over God’s will and timing in this area of our
family, and God’s answers have frankly not had the outcome that I have desired
so deeply. I have given God many “reasons” for my family planning desires:
- I love being a mom. I love nurturing
and taking care of my family. I love watching Riley Grace grow, change, and
learn about the Lord. I love having such a vital and prominent role in her
development, and see that as a God-given calling and responsibility.
- I love seeing Patrick embrace his role
as a father. The memory of us finding out we were pregnant with Riley Grace is
forever etched in my mind. Two months into marriage, we found out we were
pregnant. This was a huge shock! Patrick was overjoyed to tears (if you know
him or have ever heard him preach, the tears are not a shock ;-) ), but I was a
little sick to my stomach, not immediately overjoyed. My first response to
change is usually stress, and that’s what I did in that situation, too. Patrick
is an amazingly loving and gentle daddy who teaches Riley Grace about God’s
love and Christ’s character each day, and I love seeing Him embrace this role.
- I want Riley Grace to have a sibling,
and I hoped they’d be close in age. I am so thankful for my sisters. I can’t
imagine growing up without siblings. I cherish the many memories we have
together, even the silly arguments we joke about now. I cherish the friendships
that continue to cultivate that are deeper now, as we have grown. I cherish the
lessons I’ve learned and how we bonded in hard seasons. I cherish learning so
much from each of them and looking up to them in different ways. I want Riley
Grace to experience that! I want her to have a close friend in the house that
she can bond with in a different way that she bonds with us. I want them to
grow up into adulthood with a deep bond that only siblings have.
- Riley Grace wants a sibling – in
particular a sister, but in her words, she’ll “use a brother” if that’s what God
decides. ;-) She has prayed every night (for at least 6 months now) for God to
give her a sister. She tells us daily that she’s “starving for a sister” (she’s
a little dramatic…) and it’s “not fair that all of her friends have
sisters and brother to play with.” She constantly tells me that she wishes I
already had a baby in my belly.
As
I’ve evaluated my now 3-year wait to get pregnant, along with evaluating many
conversations that Patrick and I have had, I can see that I have not used this
wait for God’s glory. Riley Grace constantly asks why she doesn’t have a sister
and why God hasn’t allowed it to happen, and my consistent answer is that it
must not be God’s plan yet, that God’s plan is the best, and that we can keep
asking Him for our heart’s desire and trust His answer. If I’m honest though,
that is many times just my rote response rather than my heartfelt belief. If
I’m honest, I have the same attitude as someone comparing themselves with
others in the grocery line. It’s not fair that my friends have X amount of kids
or that their kids are X years apart, etc. My attitude is not much different
than Riley Grace’s at times about all the things that “aren’t fair” with my
long period of waiting. (Can anyone else relate to the "not fair" childlike attitude that we slip into during seasons of waiting??) In all actuality though, this attitude is where I see
that my God-given desire to have another child may be turning into more of an
idol than a healthy longing.
What
started out as a God-given desire turned into the focus of many self-centered
prayers, tears, worries, complaints, comparisons, and what-ifs about how I
would handle if having a second child wasn’t in God’s plan at all. These
thoughts have paralyzed me at times, living on the verge of tears for many
seasons where I could think of nothing else but “what if” God didn’t answer my
prayers in the way that I wanted and that this season of waiting was truly an
indefinite season. I’ve been challenged to see that while my initial heart’s
desire of motherhood and raising children was good, the way that I’ve handled
the seemingly indefinite wait has not always been pleasing or glorifying to the
Lord.
So,
rather than giving up or spiraling into depression, I’ve been challenged to ask
myself some hard questions:
- How can God use my wait for His glory?
- Is my desire for another child
honoring to the Lord or has it become an idolatrous desire? Do I desire God's good gifts more than I desire God?
- How can I minister to others who are
experiencing a similar season of waiting? (Focusing on and ministering to others is a great way to gain a godly perspective that - while God cares about our desires and our heart - it's ultimately not about us! And we don't want to waste the time God has given us focusing only on ourselves!)
- How can I teach Riley Grace about
God’s good and perfect will even in the midst of her little longings and
desires?
- How can I still pray for and desire
this without being consumed by it or making it into an idol?
- What other things can I turn my
attention to? How can I be kingdom-focused rather than self-focused in this
hard season?
- How can I grow closer to the Lord? In
what ways can I seek Him (and not just for His good gifts) in order to know Him
more intimately and truly long for His will, not my own?
Are you in a
season of waiting? Have you recently been in a season of waiting? Do you know
someone who’s experiencing a hard season of waiting? How can God use this
season in your life for His glory? I challenge you to go back through the
questions above and apply them to your own season of waiting.
Believe me, I
know that it is hard not to allow our heavy emotions and doubts to take over,
but honestly that’s exactly what the enemy wants to do in our lives. The
adversary will use any means necessary to take our focus off of the Lord. I’m
certainly not saying that it’s Satan’s doing that I’m in the season I’m in; I
believe that God is fully in control of my season of waiting, BUT the devil
does want to use my tendency toward fears, doubts, frustrations, etc. to make
me doubt God during the wait, become angry with God’s timing, and become even
more self-centered about why God hasn’t followed “my plans” for “my family.” The
enemy would love for me to be completely unproductive for God’s kingdom as a
wallow through my wait, focusing on what God hasn’t given me rather than all
the things He has already given me and all the ways He’s working around me!
Father, I pray for my sisters who are
struggling with a very real season of waiting.
I pray that You would guard them against doubting Your faithfulness and
losing sight of Your pure love and sovereign control. Use each of us for Your
glory within our seasons of waiting. Strengthen our resolve to trust in You and
Your perfect plans. Allow us to see how You’re moving and how we can obey You
in hard times. Show us others that need to be encouraged, and give us the faith
to be used by You, rather than sitting idly by in self-pity or depression.
Forgive us for not glorifying You in seasons of waiting, but show us how to be
about Your kingdom completely while still praying for our heart’s desires, but
not being consumed by them. Align our heart’s desires with Yours and rid our
hearts of any selfishness. We love you and thank you for your faithful love and
presence in our lives. In Christ alone, Amen.
Always, Jacquelyn
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