Speed Limit
I wait for the LORD, my soul waits, and in his word I hope. Psalm 130:5 ESV
Wait – I don’t like to wait. I don’t like to wait for anything. I hate lines. I want to get there now. No red lights, no detours, no queues. Just a freeway without traffic. Pedal to the metal. Unfortunately, the world will not accommodate me.
And neither will God.
“Waiting with steadfast endurance is a great expression of faith. It means enduring patiently in confident hope that God will decisively act for the salvation of his people (Gen 49:18). Waiting involves the very essence of a person’s being, his soul (nepeš; Ps 130:5). Those who wait in true faith are renewed in strength so that they can continue to serve the Lord while looking for his saving work (Isa 40:31).” [1]
I cannot appreciate who God is unless I understand and practice the Hebrew verb qawa. This verb includes waiting, looking for and hoping. All three concepts express the Hebraic idea of eager expectation. Waiting is not passive. When I wait, I anticipate. I set my stance in the blocks, ready for the signal to run. But in order to enter the race, I must wait for the sound of the gun, and in spiritual terms, this means waiting for the sound of His voice. It is so easy to run ahead of God, but what is the point? He will simply bring me back to the starting line and require me to get ready again. But it’s not my soul that waits in the blocks. It’s nephesh – all of who I am – the person, me! Waiting is not simply a spiritual game. This eager anticipation must be learned in my embodied self. False-start penalties don’t happen because I think about moving.
Hartley draws attention to the important insight that as a follower of YHWH waiting is at the very center of my being. Nefesh without qawa is a body of animal instinct, not a human being. Human beings delay in order to hear God’s word. Unless I practice qawa, I will slip toward automatic response and that will prevent me from becoming human. By the way, since my instinctual mechanics constantly push me toward immediate gratification (a sure sign of the domination of the yetzer ha’ra), I have to learn to wait. It doesn’t come naturally. What comes naturally is the assumption that I am the master of my own world and everyone else should make way for me. What I must learn is that I am neither Nebuchadnezzar nor Solomon. What I must learn is that if I am to serve Him and become myself I must practice being Joseph. Oh, so that was the point of the story!
The spontaneous result of trust is waiting. If you want to measure your trust level with God, examine your ability to wait. Patience is not only a virtue. It is a picture of confidence in the word of the Lord. I can’t wait until I learn that lesson.
Topical Index: wait, qawa, trust, Psalm 130:5
[1] Hartley, J. E. (1999). 1994, קָוָה. In R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer, Jr. & B. K. Waltke (Eds Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament (R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer, Jr. & B. K. Waltke, Ed.) (electronic ed.) (791). Chicago: Moody Press.
Haha, I can’t wait until I learn to wait too!
Though at times, it just isn’t up to us, meaning we do need to wait, no choice, nothing we can do but wait upon YHWH, can’t take the risk. :- ) It’s like trying to beat the red traffic light so as not to have to wait for the green! Not me, but some folks I know 🙂
This is a great text and meditation for use in Biblical Counseling. So many I work with are so impatient to get better, be better now! Of course, this applies to me also. I think I will have to practice a whole lot more to make this really work for me.
“I can’t wait to see Jesus
In His glory as He bursts from the sky”
So begins a favorite song I listened to many times in college.
Here’s a Youtube link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=koaUSgSjQyY
As I listen to the lyrics and contemplate them, I kind of think Pat Terry, the songs author
has some of Skip’s thoughts incorporated in them. Anticipation, a measured trust coming from the truths
of Scripture, confidence, joy and heart felt love for Yeshua.
“I can’t wait.” It’s ironic that statement really acknowledges, at least with me, the obvious need to wait as we don’t know when it will be, just that it will. An expression of anticipation, desire and wonderment looking forward with surety that it will happen. He’s there for us.
I can’t wait, either.
Great message. Funny how most of our impatience is with other people, rarely ourselves.
All too true Ian, great insight.
I’m not impatient, I’m not, I’m not, I’m not, I’m not, I’m not!!!!
James 1.4
Gold is put into the furnace only that it may be purified.
And after we have learned the other graces; faith, virtue, knowledge, temperance, etc. we have need of patience, Heb. 10:36.
Count it all joy.
this reminds me of a saying I once heard that influenced me a lot.
“What you say No to, determines what you get.”
This saying has often helped me to wait, knowing something better was in the future, from God.
If I make a quick response out of his will, I’ve learned I will be sorry.
So…’nepes’, my essence, (or mind, character; greek ‘soul’) is wrapped up in ‘nepesh’ (body in both hebrew and greek). Correct?
I’m good with this. Nepes would be the driving force for either my body or spirit. It doesn’t separate from me, it IS me, whether i am clothed in human or spirit form.
When we were created in his image we were created in spirit, the ‘body’ was added for this world. That is why we are who we truly are, in spirit, first and then we manifest via the body. How our body looks in the here and now may or may not be what we see in the hereafter.
Because YWHW is spirit. Not human.
The idea that we were created as spirit and later wrapped in a body is thoroughly Greek mysticism, not biblical. You will need to rethink this. Listen to the lectures on Dionysus.
But we have been promised new bodies. Yeshua is keeping His glorified one. We get ours glorified, too. Next time. Although the process can start this time. Manifesting is essential. Even YHVH saw the necessity of it. Bodies are what make us particulars in the Body. This is supercool stuff to me…