I wait for the Lord, my whole being waits,
and in his word I put my hope.
—Psalm 130:5 NIV
Like most of us, I hate waiting. If the car in front of me waits half a second when the light turns green, I want to blow my horn. I search the grocery store registers for not only the shortest line but also the one that has the least items on the belt. If someone says they’ll get right back to me, I am quick to find fault with them if their definition of “right back” is longer than mine.
I have been in a season of waiting. A long season. I lost my job of 15 years about 16 months ago now. I’m working some part-time jobs and have sent out resumes, but I need full-time employment. And, God, I need it now.
I’ve also been in a long season of grief: my sister passed away in 2014, my mom in 2015, my dad earlier this year. Last week we closed on selling Mom & Dad’s house of 40 years, which felt like losing them all over again—another grief. And losing my job in 2016—which meant I also lost a lot of friends, self-esteem, and income—also felt like grief. Add to that the loss of my other sister way back in 1983 and her husband two years later—losses that I’m not sure I ever really processed. I have lost so much of my family, which is such a lonely feeling—and another feeling of grief. And my one and only child went off to college to live on campus this fall—yes, more feelings of grief. Grief upon grief upon grief.
I bring up the grief because I have found that in some ways grief is also about waiting. Waiting for the grief to be over. Waiting for joy again. Waiting for stability again. Waiting for God to heal the hurt.
The psalmist expresses this season of waiting in Psalm 130:5: “I wait for the Lord, my whole being waits…”
He doesn’t just wait. His entire being waits. The Amplified version states it as “I wait [patiently] for the Lord, my soul [expectantly] waits…”
The Pulpit Commentary explains:
“Waiting for the Lord” is patiently bearing our affliction, whatever it may be, and confidently looking forward to deliverance from it in God’s good time. The expression “my soul doth wait” [KJV] is stronger than “I wait”; it implies heart-felt trust and confidence.
The author of this psalm further defines this feeling of waiting in verse 6 (NIV):
I wait for the Lord
more than watchmen wait for the morning,
more than watchmen wait for the morning.
Note the repetition in this verse, meant to make us stop and think.
Think of yourself as someone in the military on night watch. You are anxiously awaiting morning for your shift to be over. The night drags slowly—there’s that waiting again. You are tired, sleepy even. It is a challenge to stay alert. The mind tends to play tricks on us in the dark. You think and dwell on things you never think about in the daylight. This is what authors refer to as the dark night of the soul.
But one thing is always certain: daylight will come. Morning has never failed to arrive. There’s an expectancy here: we know with certainty that even in the darkest of nights, morning is right around the corner.
But what is it that we are “waiting” for? Deliverance from whatever has us in its grip? Certainly. But more than that.
And so the psalmist is waiting on God for that sense of His presence. He is waiting and hoping for the intimacy with God that he formerly knew. He wants God’s assurance that he is His child.
The second part of verse 5 elaborates on this: “…and in his word I put my hope.”
As Christians, we do not wait as those who have no hope. We wait with expectancy, with certainty, with hope. Hope in God’s Word.
As I wait for deliverance I am to put my hope in God and His Word and wait for—and seek—His presence. If nothing else comes out of this season of grief and waiting, if I seek God more, hide more of His Word in my heart, converse with Him in prayer more—in short, grow closer to Him, then it will have been worth it. And my contentment will be more in Him than in my situation.
That’s my prayer for me. And my prayer for you, the reader.
I pray to God—my life a prayer—
and wait for what he’ll say and do.
My life’s on the line before God, my Lord,
waiting and watching till morning,
waiting and watching till morning.
—Psalm 130:5-6 MSG