Pastor's Point - May 2024
Dear Church Family,
On Sunday, April 21st I shared with our church family three things that the Apostles did while at Jerusalem as they were waiting for the coming of the Holy Spirit. Now I confessed on that Sunday that waiting is not my favorite thing to do in life. I like to get things done, I have trouble being idle, and in my flesh, I can struggle with being impatient. I am sure I am not alone in this. Maybe you feel the same way about seasons of waiting. But the reality of life is that we all find ourselves marking time in our lives by seasons of waiting.
The Apostles did three things in their waiting according to Acts 1:12-26. They prayed to God, they understood their lives considering the truth of Scripture, and they trusted in God because they knew He was in control. Praying, studying scripture, and trusting God are wonderful things to do while we wait. Actively waiting is so much more beneficial than passively waiting. When we busy ourselves with prayer, studying the Word, and a trusting attitude towards God will protect our hearts from the corrosive effects of passively waiting. When we become passive in our waiting, we tend to process our lives in our own wisdom which often encourages, distrust, bitterness, and anger towards God. These are great dangers to us as we live our lives.
You see while we are actively waiting by praying, reading scripture, and trusting God we have the benefit of hoping while we wait. Psalm 27:14 states… “Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the Lord.” It is possible for hope to grow even while we wait. And while we hopefully wait, we can find that our faith will increase because we know we are waiting on our God who is sovereign over all.
But also waiting helps us to have a proper perspective in life. I was reading an article by Jeff Robinson about waiting and in it he writes… “When we bring urgent petitions before the Lord, we wait with expectation, and the city of man in which we live fades in importance as we begin to realize that the city of God is primary. As Jonathan Edwards prayed, “O Lord, stamp eternity on my eyeballs.” Waiting helps to do that. It prioritizes the eternal over the temporal in accord with 2 Corinthians 4:18: “as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.” It can be hard to keep proper perspective in life as it relates to eternity in our seasons of waiting. We can become so consumed with our immediate circumstances that we lose focus in life as it relates to eternity.
Let’s make it our aim as we live our lives in seasons of waiting to pray, focus on God’s Word, and have a heart that trusts God. We will benefit greatly as these disciplines guard our hearts from bitterness, anger, and distrust. And as we live this way, God’s wisdom will encourage us to have a proper perspective in life. As Jonathon Edwards said… “O Lord, stamp eternity on my eyeballs.”
I love you and I love being your pastor!