Waiting by Gina Rouse

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YA'LL.

I'm so thrilled to have a guest blogger and my good friend (prayer warrior, confidant, secret-keeper and mentor) Gina Rouse on the blog this week talking about a sometimes-dreaded but ever-important topic to our walk with Christ...waiting. I met Gina about 3 years ago while training for my first marathon. She loves Jesus, her husband and three kids something fierce. She's one of the most compassionate and kind women of God that I know. And let me tell you, something special happens when she laces up her tennis shoes and starts running. She's won the Knoxville marathon the last 3 consecutive years and has qualified to race the marathon in the Olympic trails in 2020. I'm blessed (alongside many others) to call her "friend" and I'm just going to let her take it away - enjoy!

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Waiting. Ugh! Do you know anyone that enjoys waiting? Like, I mean actually likes standing
in line waiting at the grocery store, waiting for your coffee, waiting for the wifi to
connect, waiting for Christmas to come, the traffic to move, the pay check to arrive,
the diagnosis, the phone call, the next season in life, your passion to come alive.

Waiting. It’s so not easy and it’s so not natural for any of us, especially in America.
Everything is so fast paced and immediate. We live 90 miles an hour and on 3 cups
of coffee a day don’t we?

What if I told you strength actually rises when we wait upon the Lord as the song
goes? What if in the waiting, you’re actually becoming who you’re meant to be?

If you hurried and were at "the place" you wanted to be at, you wouldn’t be fully
prepared, equipped, or brave enough to do the thing you’re called to do.

Think about an oak tree. Did you know it takes over 100 years for the trunk of an oak tree to fully develop? 100 years!

What about Abraham and Sarah?

They received their “calling” or promise of a child from the Lord SEVENTY FIVE years before he actually was born! No wonder they are included in the “hall of faith” in Hebrews! “Abraham
believed God and He credited it to him as righteousness. (Genesis 15:6)” Is it
possible for you and me to have that kind of faith in Abraham’s God? To be willing to
wait and let patience and perseverance have its perfect work in us (James
1:4-8)?

My husband, children and I are in a season of waiting. I need to confess I am more
like a stubborn mule than sweet little lamb when it comes to patience. I imagine the
Lord having to put a spiritual leash and collar on me at times because I want to run
ahead so fast and just get to “the getting” without counting the cost, thinking twice,
or fully evaluating the situation. I bet you can guess I’m married to a hunk of guy
who happens to be the complete opposite.

He always counts the cost and takes everything into full account. That’s why he’s awesome at what he does. You can imagine the struggle though of what a season of waiting might bring to our daily conversations, prayers, and action steps when two different people are trying to
wait under the same roof! (Please laugh out loud with me here!) There’s this constant
tension of hurrying up to "do the thing" and the pulling back to "let the thing unfold".
There’s Matt trying to walk in faith and obedience and hear the Lord show us the
way forward with bravery and courage. Then there’s me trying (albeit imperfectly)
to trust and wait quietly (submissively) that if God’s got my husband’s heart, he will
choose the right path and eventually we will get there.

To be more specific, Matt and I made a commitment at our wedding ceremony (a
decade ago) to be “on mission” with Him, whatever that looked like or wherever
that might take us. We’ve had 3 kids and 3 moves since then and a lot of life has
happened. This current season of waiting is preparing us for the next step of being
on mission. We think we have a pretty good idea of what that looks like, but what
I’m realizing is we’re never gonna get the cart before the horse. Finding and
following God’s will is so much more about just living every day seeking Him, praying, reading your Bible and allowing the circumstances to unfold.

If He’s really King of it all, He’s King of it all, all the time.

Even on days when it’s raining, and the mail you expected doesn’t come, the appointment you really needed to happen is postponed, and the sermon you were hoping would give you the clear direction still seems somewhat fuzzy like a camera lens out of focus. Day by day and moment by moment you begin to see the trajectory of what God is up to. You see His big picture coming to life. It literally is one step in front of the other, just like the marathon. And
if you’ve ever run a marathon, it’s never over fast.

Here are some waiting lessons I’ve learned so far:

1. Do the next thing. Faithfully do what you can while trusting Him to do what you can't.

2. Put your yes on the table. Make sure you’ve committed to “the call” and do it
again, and again. Saying "yes" in the small things allows God to move and orchestrate the details. He doesn’t need our permission but I think it frees us up because it puts the control in
the rightful place (God is on the throne of our hearts). 

3. Focus on His promises. Remember that He did not spare His own Son to pay for
our deepest need (forgiveness of sin) so He will not spare any good thing for you.
He who began a good work, will be faithful to complete it. (Philippians 2)

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Prayer for the entrepreneur:

Jesus, every good and perfect thing comes from You. You are not the author of confusion, doubt or anxiety. Help me cast my worries and cares about the future onto You and trust in Your perfect time and provision. Give me strength as I pursue my next logical step of obedience.

In Your name,
​Amen