Thursday, September 17, 2009

Waiting for the Lord

In "Trusting in God Through Tears," Jehu Thomas Burton discusses his spiritual struggles following the death of his son. "No amount of discussion with someone else was going to persuade me to trust in God. I had to reach out in faith and choose to trust Him even when there was zero evidence or reason to do such...As I long to be with Him, I must wait until His appointed time. I must hold onto His promises of deliverance and of eternal life. These are documented in His Word and are my hope, a hope rooted in the trust that God will deliver what He promises." Burton, 103.

The Word teaches me to hope in God and in His redeeming power. And the Word tells us to wait on God. Psalm 27:13-14 says,
"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!" Similarly, Psalm 130:5: "I wait for the LORD, my soul waits, and in his word I put my hope."

Even when we don't see God's goodness, we must wait upon the Lord. Now. Next week. Next year. 10 years from now. Until we see the Lord face and face, when at last all we have lost will be made new, we must wait for the Lord. During these days when we still find ourselves, out of habit, expecting to hear our son cry at night, see him after work or feed him at his meal times, we must wait for the Lord. Even now, when we don't understand the end that God accomplished through Micah's short life, we must continue to wait and trust in His goodness to us.

4 comments:

  1. Thank you for continuing to share your journey of grief.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thank you for sharing your grief with me. I have benefited from your thoughts. I can't say my grief is the same as yours, but it runs deep in a different way. My husband and I prayed for children for 5 years and then began the adoption process. We adopted a little girl and called her our own for almost a week before the birthmother changed her mind and we lost our daughter. It has been 18 months and though we have adopted since, I still grieve the loss of my first baby girl. I have not always 'felt' the goodness of the Lord...but I have chosen to trust, knowing He loves me as a father loves his children. Knowing how much I loved our daughter, and knowing my father in heaven loves me at least that much....He must have good for me.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Heather and Cory- I thought of you both when I saw this picture. I wonder how many times Christ comtemplated the great suffering He would experience on the cross. Surely He fellowships with you in your suffering right now.
    www.thejourneysproject.com/image-detail.aspx?id=325

    ReplyDelete
  4. Constant in pray for you in these hard days!

    Chris & Angie Carey

    ReplyDelete