Thursday 30 May 2013

Courage in Waiting

Teach me your way, O Lord, and lead me in a level path, because of my enemies.
Deliver me not over unto the will of my enemies: for false witnesses are risen up against me, and such as breathe out cruelty.
I would have fainted, unless I had believed to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.
Wait on the Lord: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen your heart: wait, I say, on the Lord. (Psalm 27:11-14)
I always thought courage meant having a strong heart, but this says that we should "be of good courage, and he shall strengthen" our hearts. So perhaps courage is the waiting? Just sitting ourselves down and waiting when we don't know how long it will be and we don't have the heart for it anymore?

Am I Jacob - unwilling or unable to trust in God's heart toward me and accept His goodness, unless He wrestles me to the ground? Why do I find myself asking so often, when all that He gives is Good?

O Father, I am so tired of waiting. I am so tired of being weak, weary, dependent. The enemy breathes out cruelty and I am heart-hurt. Yes, again. 

You are Good. You give Good. Even when it doesn't feel that way, I will hold tight to the truth of who You are. I will have the Good that You have promised. You can give no less. I can't see You. I don't always feel how You love me. But You know my heart. All the way down, beneath it all, I believe in Your goodness, in Your love. I am waiting for You, even when I don't want to, when I don't feel like it, when I feel impatient and tired and too-weak and too-unworthy. You are beautiful. You are kind. You see me. You have not forgotten. I will let You choose how to give me Good, and You will give me nothing less than Your very best.

Thank you for this hurt. Thank you for breaking me down and exposing my weakness and backing me into dark corners. Thank you for taking me apart, piece by piece. I trust You to put me together again. This, too, is Your gift. Give me the grace to reach out my hands to accept all that You have for me. Let me see Jesus, and teach me to feel that He is worth any cost. Let me know You. Let me bring honour to You in the cold and the dark. Light my way with Your Love. Make me more than I am.  You know how tired I am, but I will wait for You because I believe Your Word. I believe You.

1 comment:

joeyanne said...

Back when reeling from disappointment after disappointment; when you told me "just sing"; I found this promise - ...to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living... and I held on to it - hardly daring to believe that it was there in black and white. I knew rest and joy and peace would be mine for eternity, but now? here? And it is. And sometimes I can't see it or feel it, but it is. And the promise was that I would SEE it. And I did.