Welcome to Whispers of Grace. As an artist and scholar of religion, I hope to bring something unique and worthwhile. These reflections, devotions, or whatever you choose to call them, are personal. These are my thoughts as I struggle to live in the same world and serve the same God as you. I pray that they bring value when you read them, as they do to me when I write them.
-Rondall Reynoso
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Expectant Waiting: Longing for God, Not Answers
(Psalm 130:5)
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“I wait for the Lord; my soul waits, and in his word I hope.”
Psalm 130:5
Reflection
Waiting is hard. We want answers, and we want them now.
My wife says that God is always on time, but He is never early. There is a lot of truth in that, or at least there has been in our lives. Often, when my wife and I are waiting for doors to open or guidance, it happens, but not when we want it.
Of course, if it happened when we wanted it, we would not have to trust in Him. We would not have to lean on Him.
As important as that is, this verse is talking about a different kind of waiting. This verse isn’t talking about a nervous waiting; it is talking about an expectant waiting. An excited waiting for God’s forgiveness, love, and redemption.
Think of it in the following way. There is a type of waiting that occurs when we are waiting to hear how much a new transmission will cost. There is another kind of waiting when we are waiting to hear if we got the job we want. Those are not the type of waiting in this verse.
This is more akin to the waiting that happens when we have been separated from our spouse for an extended period, and we are waiting to see them. There is an excitement, a longing.
We should long for God.
When I was younger, I felt like I was taught to fear God. In my mind, He was like the playground yard duty, just watching and waiting for me to do something wrong.
But that isn’t God. There are several reasons why the metaphor of marriage is used in Scripture for our corporate and individual relationships with God. Let’s try replacing ‘the Lord’ with ‘my Love’ in this verse.
“I wait for my Love; my soul waits, and in their word I hope.”
I think that gets at the fuller sense of this verse. We should take pleasure in God. We should long for him. He is our hope in a real and personal way.
