God makes me wait. It might to have something to do with my being fairly vocal about not liking the wait. And sometimes it’s an incredibly long time. I waited a long time for the right God opportunity to live internationally. A long time.

But when you wait, when it FINALLY comes…it’s so good, right?

The waiting placed me in Haiti, and there is this word in Creole that I use a lot at the villages, ‘tale.’ It basically means wait a second, hang on. The kids are normally all clamoring for attention and unfortunately, humans only have two arms and two legs. Today, however, one of our Canadian friends had about 10 boys all hanging on him. On his shoulders, two on his back, one in each arm and others just being around him.

Later, I was making the most professional looking pipe cleaner flower ring ever, and I had many wanting to learn how to make it. The amount of times I used the word ‘tale’ are too numerous to count. But as I watch them wait their turn when when I tell them, and they have patience that I do not. Granted, sometimes there is the ‘older kid’ shuffle when others line jump, but those kids who have a thirst to learn, and want to see…they are willing to wait as long as it takes and they will remind you they are still there.

I can learn from this, as well as a plethora of other things from the kids…but this practice of being present in the wait I can learn from.

I believe that I shall look upon the goodness of the LORD in the land of the living! Wait for the LORD; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the LORD!” [Psalms 27:13-14 ESV]

I have this on my wall in my room in metal art. I almost didn’t want it, for a rather obscure reason, because I actually have a metal art addiction. It didn’t have what I like to think of the ‘wait’ sandwich. I think there is a very good reason why it says ‘Wait for the Lord,’ not once, but TWICE. It’s actually comforting for me to see that I’m not the only one who has issues in waiting. It’s all of us, right?

I also think there is a reason that the middle of the ‘wait’ sandwich it says, ‘be strong, and let your heart take courage.’ It is hard to wait. To look out there and see something on the horizon or catch a small glimpse of something for the future, and the timing says wait.

I read something yesterday from Jesus Calling: ‘When you try to figure out the future, you are grasping at things that are Mine. This, like all forms of worry, is an act of rebellion: doubting My promises to care for you.’

Hard words to read? Tough to swallow? Yah, yesterday, me too. I don’t like seeing my actions as being rebellious against God. And it’s not that I am never rebellious, it’s just I’m normally rebellious FOR him, not against him.

So we wait. We choose to be strong and we let our hearts take courage. As I sometimes see in the kids, when something is worth the wait…it is worth it to be still and chill out while you are waiting, eventually the timing will be right.