But those who wait on 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
Chances are this is a familiar scripture. This is one of those popular verses that gets plastered on billboards, turned into T-shirts, passed out on bookmarks and seen on bumper stickers and church signs. It's the kind of verse that is used to try to encourage someone who is weary and tired of the fight, and yet, when someone tries to use it on us we may feel like it's just an empty platitude without giving much, if any, real help. Why? Why do we sometimes feel like a scripture from the Word which is truth promising the ability to go through with endurance, not being overcome with weariness or fainting, feel like little to no help? It must be more than just because it's been overused.
I don't think that this verse has lost impact due to overuse as much as due to our misunderstanding of that first part....the waiting part. Let's be honest here, most of us aren't good at waiting, don't like to wait, and if we're really honest don't usually feel like we should have to. I want what I want, and I want it now. What's the use in even having a God if He won't help me when and how I want Him to?
Our attitude on waiting on the Lord shows both misunderstanding and our tendency towards self. We may picture something like someone lost in the wilderness or stuck on the side of a mountain or on a roof amidst rising floodwaters waiting on rescue, vaguely hoping someone shows up before they die. Or, if we can grasp the Daddy aspect of God a little better than some vague rescuer, we may imagine something more like an older child who has been left at school or who is at a mall waiting for a ride. They know Mom or Dad loves them and hasn't forgotten them, but sheesh, when are they going to get here? They've been waiting forever, and they have homework to do and XBox to play, and can't the parents understand that they are bored and uncomfortable and this sitting around waiting for a ride is interfering with their life? They dream of the day when they get their license and a car so that they are no longer dependent on Mom and or Dad.
And if any of that is anything like what we imagine when we hear or read wait on the Lord, we've missed it. So all that comes after doesn't help much, since the rest of the verse is a result of the first part. I don't really like the whole Christian soldier metaphor that gets used, but in this case it is more accurate than what is usually conjured up by the idea of waiting. There are a couple of different ways of imagining a soldier rather than a child or average person in need of rescue and they each accurately represent the concept of waiting on the Lord as is intended by the verse. Before I go on, let me say that wait may have been a great word choice at one time, but it's not really anymore, now that we have turned waiting into something negative and to be avoided. They that wait on the Lord is more accurately translated as Those who are expectant of the Lord.
Imagine the soldier stuck in the foxhole, trying to hold the line, outnumbered and low on resources. If something doesn't happen soon, all will be lost. One soldier turns to the rest and makes an impassioned speech, encouraging the rest not to give up. Reinforcements are coming. Our army is more powerful than theirs. When help arrives they will not only hold the line but advance it. The enemy will be defeated, but until help gets here, and it will, they need to hold that line no matter what. The men find strength they thought they didn't have. There is a second wind as they muster up determination to not fail before the help they know is coming gets there. They become heroes who last longer than anyone would imagine possible because they expect it to matter later what they do now in the battle.
Add to that scene one soldier being sent for help because the radios aren't working. He becomes a runner. He fully expects that if he can reach his goal in time all will be saved because forces will be mounted to get to the battle. His expectancy of finding help for himself and his brothers gives him strength to go on. He runs beyond his strength and his endurance. He doesn't faint. He continues because it's not hopeless as long as he doesn't give up, but he knows defeat is waiting if he quits.
We aren't waiting like we're sitting around hoping God might possibly come through for us in time. We are expectant that God is going to be victorious, and while the battle is already won, there is somehow still a part for us to play. If we tap into that expectancy, it gives us strength to continue the fight, to keep going. We find we are able to endure when before that expectancy there was nothing but weariness. We can run with some mysterious resource powering us, even though we don't have the energy on our own. We can stay diligent rather than fainting. We can even soar above the circumstances and see the battle from the higher view of God and see that despite how it may look from the foxhole, all is not lost.
Waiting isn't negative. It's eager, energizing expectation for God to be faithful to His word. And in that there is strength to continue. It's not doing nothing or hesitating. It's continuing to do what we have been called to do, no matter what, until the expected help from God appears. When we are faced with impossible odds, discouraged and weary, let us not hesitate. Let us hurry up and wait upon the Lord. Hold the line!
Today's Unshackled Echo was previously published on
June 20, 2016.
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