Eagles Wings!

            Wait.  We’re not very good at waiting.  We seem to do a lot of it.  We wait in traffic during our daily commute.  We wait in grocery lines, for our computer to get on-line, in bank lines, and in buffet lines.  We spend countless hours waiting, and still we fuss and fume and our blood pressure rises.  Yet wait is exactly what God tells us to do.

“Yet those who wait for the Lord will gain new strength; they will mount up with wings as eagles, they will run and not get tired, they will walk and not become weary.”  Isaiah 40:31

            Waiting involves sitting still.  It involves inactivity.  At its best, it’s restful.  Waiting on the Lord means staying where we are until He makes His action or His word clear.  Waiting on the Lord means bypassing ethical shortcuts to success and allowing God to provide.  It means doing things His way, in His timing.  Like Jacob, we want to manipulate circumstances to our benefit and allow the ends to justify the means.  Waiting on God necessitates knowing that, to Him, the means and methods we use are just as important, maybe more important than the ends.  Waiting on God implies listening.  Only when we wait, when we get quiet and cease our striving, can we open our spiritual ears to hear what God is saying. 

            It is interesting that the progression in this verse has us slowing down.  When we gain new strength we begin by soaring like eagles.  Often new Believers are filled with a zeal and spiritual energy that older Christians covet.  As we mature we slow down to a more sustainable, consistent run.  As we wait on Him and His direction we gain new strength by doing those tasks He has called us to rather than trying to do every good thing in our own strength.  Older Christians have often slowed to a walk.  As our bodies age we come to understand that who we are is more important to God than what we do.

            Waiting on the Lord takes enormous faith.  We must believe that He is personal enough to see us waiting, and to give us direction when His timing is right.  It’s much easier to rush off, doing whatever seems right in our own eyes, following our own understanding than to take the risk of never hearing God’s clear voice.  It can seem like too much of a gamble, too much to risk our faith on.

            We can trust God.  We can wait and know that our strength will be renewed.

 He who promised is faithful.