The Spirituality of “Wait and See”

For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it.

A while back, I wrote a short post entitled “Give Up, Give In.” In this post, I wrote of giving God the reigns of life. In a similar post, I wrote concerning the necessity of giving of our sense of lordship over our own lives to God, for it is rightfully His. I feel burdened to continue on that discussion (or, reword what has already been written…twice now, as some might say).

I worry too much. That statement alone proves such a thing because worry itself is too much; there is no measurement of “worry.” The reason I have struggled with worry is because I have battled it poorly (or, incorrectly). You see, I can recite verse after verse that talk about God’s authority, Christ’s sovereignty, and the promise of good for those who love Providence. Each of those verses, however, require something more than memorization. They require a discipline that is foreign to the human will.

Trusting in God is not pragmatic. So many times, though, we champion our “trust in God” after the ordeal is over and the blessings have arrived. Have we really trusted in God? Are the blessings really “good and perfect gifts…from the Father of lights” or are they simply “treasures on earth” that do nothing more than make us feel good for a short while, erode away, and once again create in us the desire to chase those ever-elusive happiness triggers? It depresses me to recall how often my discourse post-storm had been sprinkled with “…only by God…” or “God knew what He was doing,” when my prayers during-storm had been “What are you doing God… and why?!”

As is evident by the latter statement, so often in my life I have been anxious to get the storm over with and learn the lesson that waited for me on the blue horizon. That, that is why worry has been a struggle for me. You see, I have come to the belief that part of trusting God is a simple waiting on Him. Psalm 46.10: “Be still and know that I am God.” Isaiah 40.31: “But those who wait upon the Lord…” Psalm 62.1: “Truly my soul silently waits for God.”

I, if you will, defined this belief while reading Passion and Purity by Elisabeth Elliot. In that book she quotes Addison Leitch:

When the will of God crosses the will of man, somebody has to die.

As much as I know that that is a reference to the crucifixion first and foremost, and following it is a reference to the casting off of the old self Paul writes about, I believe it has another implication as well. Maybe (and I’m still working through this but am confident enough to assert this), maybe the waiting part of trusting God is the death–or crucifixion–of my own biased desires. I do not believe it to be an untruth to view the “waiting” as the death of my will and the triumph (or granted Lordship) of His.

Giving God the reigns means not only do I seek His will, I also must conform how I seek His will. This is why waiting and trusting is so hard! I can blame it on the fact that I am a guy and, as a genetic rule, guys view problems in terms of solutions. Therefore, I view storms in terms of lessons I can learn from them. I can pass the buck to the fact that I am a perfectionist, and if I’m not involved in doing it, it won’t be done properly. But the bottom line is, I am to blame because I fear when my Savior cries out, “Fear not.”

Resting on that command requires a life change. I must realize that the best I can do when I am in control is mess everything up. For as Thomas a Kempis wrote:

What hindereth thee more than thine affections not fully mortified to the will of God?