Good morning and welcome Mr. Thursday. I pray that you are all having a great week. You know sometimes it’s not really if the week is going well or not, but how we perceive the week. How we see what God puts before us. Sometimes even in great testing and trials you can find the joy of the Lord if you are walking hand in hand with Him. In fact, that’s such a great segway, we’re just going to roll with it. Today we are in Genesis 8 and we see that Noah and his family of 7 are on a sea cruise around the world. Probably not the kind of cruise that you and I are familiar with or even want to be on, but a cruise none the less. (I wonder if they had a buffet on their cruise?) But the cruise is about to come to an end after a very lengthy 370 days at sea and I think Noah, his family, and the animals are very ready to see some dry ground and get off that ship.
I always encourage people to not just read God’s Word but actually try your best to place yourself into the situation. Do your best to make it real. So, you’re on a boat packed with animals and a few of your family for one solid year. The stench alone must have been amazing! Also, you’ve had A LOT of family time, (if you know what I’m saying.) There is no one else to interact with, just the same 7 family members, Noah’s wife, his three sons and their wives. I bet you they were all aching to see other people. But that’s also a huge factor we often neglect to see. There were no other people. For the last year they have had to process the fact that everyone they have ever known is dead. Everybody. This must have been quite the emotional trauma for them all to deal with as they float along above the Earth. The daughters-in-law each lost their parents and all siblings, cousins, etc. Friends, peers, business contacts, all gone. Another amazing thing about the story of Noah is his ministry. For 120 years he preached for all to repent to God because He was bringing the flood to judge the unrighteous. And do you know how many people Noah converted in his 120 year ministry? Well, we can assume only the 7 people that are on the boat with him. Not what we today would call an effective ministry by a long shot.
So, as they finally see the rains stop and the waters recede, I’m sure there was one question. Stated from the people and unstated from the animals. How soon can we get off this boat? To answer this question Noah has to do a little surveying and to do this he becomes a birdwatcher. He sends out two birds, a raven and a dove. One unclean and one clean respectively. The raven never came back. The reason? A raven is a carrion, a scavenger. Do you think that were some dead bodies laying around after the flood? Oh boy, you’d better believe it! The raven was the first creature allowed back into the world after the waters started receding, he was out having feast after feast! The raven was an unclean bird and its behavior is symbolic of the lost returning to their old nature after encountering God. The second bird Noah sends out is a dove. The dove returns. It came from the ark of God and it returns to the ark of God. The dove is a clean animal and its behavior symbolizes a fruitful walk with God.
But what spoke to me today was the efforts of the dove and how Noah handled the news it brought. The dove first came back empty handed. Nothing. Nada. This would have been heart-breaking for me. It would mean more time on the ship. How long would this go on? Do I have another year? 2 years? So what does Noah do? He waits seven days before sending the dove out again. One full week of waiting.
A week later Noah sends the dove out again and this time it comes back with a single olive leaf in her beak. So, the dove was able to land in a tree but apparently not able to forage on the ground like dove do. So by now, Noah should be pretty anxious right? I mean this is huge! A leaf! The waters are almost gone! Go ahead and pack your bags, we’re getting off this big ol’ boat! But what does Noah do? He doesn’t send the dove right back out, or even grab it’s mate that was on board and send them both out. He waits. Another seven days. Another week of waiting.
This started me thinking about waiting. Waiting in life is a given. As I sit here writing this, I see the paperwork on my desk to go get my driver’s license changed back from Hawaii to Texas. I know that as soon as I hit that DMV office, their will be waiting. I’m getting geared up to handle the waiting with grace. It’s estimated that throughout our lives we will spend an amazing 5 years waiting in lines, traffic lights and other events. Waiting in life is a guarantee so you’d think we’d get better at it right? Why is waiting such a huge issue for us? Marge and I love to cruise but when you put 5,000 people on a ship, lines will happen. The cruise director joked that sometimes he will just start a line to nowhere and as soon as people see him waiting, they will just join in and start waiting not even knowing what they are waiting for! I guess some people are just better at waiting than me.
But waiting for a driver’s license renewal and waiting on the Lord are very different. If you were to ask me to describe one of the single most impactful facets of my walk with Christ, I would quickly say waiting. Waiting on God is a major part of walking with Him as He reveals Himself and His plan into our lives. You see, waiting on the Lord can be a form of Worship.
Waiting is moving slow. Waiting is making yourself calm down. You can’t really be in a hurry as you wait. Well, you can but you just end up driving yourself crazy. When God says wait, you wait. You can check your watch every minute, hour, week or even year, but when God says wait, you wait.
So how do we become more like Noah and grow in patience in the Lord when our patience might just be exhausted? Let’s go to the source and see what God Himself says about waiting.
“I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in his word I hope; my soul waits for the Lord more than watchmen for the morning” Psalms 130:5-6
“but they who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.” Isaiah 40:31
“Wait for the LORD and keep his way, and he will exalt you to inherit the land; you will look on when the wicked are cut off." Psalms 37:34
“ 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
“Therefore the LORD waits to be gracious to you, and therefore he exalts himself to show mercy to you. For the LORD is a God of justice; blessed are all those who wait for him.” Isaiah 30:18
“The LORD is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him.” Lamentations 3:25
“But as for me, I will look to the LORD; I will wait for the God of my salvation; my God will hear me.” Micah 7:7
“And while staying with them he ordered them not to depart from Jerusalem, but to wait for the promise of the Father.” Acts 1:4
Folks, this isn’t even scratching the surface. As I researched, I really had no idea how much God has to say to us about waiting and patience. In fact, did you know that the words “wait” and “patience” are found 174 times in God’s Word? God has a lot of wisdom for us on the art of waiting. On making waiting Worship.
So, what is the art of waiting? How do you effectually wait on the Lord? Well, it was the basis of yesterday’s study on Noah. It’s actually the whole crux of the story of Noah, the ark and the flood. FAITH. You see faith sits at the polar opposite of impatience and irrational action. If we have true, deep faith that God has a perfect plan for our lives and that He is thoroughly in control, we wait. Waiting on God with great faith is an act of Worship. The confidence that we have in our Lord results in great faith and trust in His plan for our lives. And so we wait.
Now this is not something that I’m great at. I struggle with this as much as anybody because God made me really hyper and fast moving, so slowing down and waiting can often times cause me great discomfort. But waiting on the Lord is different. As we wait on the Lord, we have Him as our companion. As we wait on the Lord, we have His Word. As we wait on the Lord it should be seen not as wasteful, mindless waiting, but time to grow in Him. As I look back on my life, I now can see that some of the largest spiritual growth moments have occurred as I was forced to wait on Him. It’s like being stuck in line as you wait somewhere. You might as well talk to the person next to you right? I think sometimes God parks us so we’ll be forced to slow down look around, acknowledge Him, and start talking. I’m thankful now for the moments where God has a period of waiting for me. That is my sign that He wants to talk. Slow down today, embrace waiting with patience, and see it as a sign that God wants to talk to you.
Start seeing waiting as Worship and wait with patience unto the Lord. Noah did, and “he waited another seven days.”
God’s blessing to you as you spend time talking with Him today through prayer, His Word and other believers.
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