What Are You Waiting On?

“Lord,” Martha said to Jesus, “If you’d been here, my brother would not have died. But I know that even now God will give you whatever you ask.” –John 11:21-22 NIV

When we have headaches, we take Tylenol, and then we wait. In almost everything we do, we know that there’s a wait time included in the process. But somehow, when it comes to prayer, we forget that fact. When we pray for God to deliver us, but He doesn’t answer immediately, we assume that He didn’t hear our prayer or that He simply doesn’t care. But the simple truth is, He’s in the waiting. In John 11, we read the story of Lazarus, who became seriously ill. His sisters, Mary and Martha, sent word for Jesus to come to heal him, explaining, “Lord, the one you love is sick” (John 11:3 NIV). But Jesus didn’t immediately drop everything and run to them. In fact, he waited for two days. When he finally arrived, Lazarus had been dead for four days. Martha ran to meet him and immediately voiced her disappointment that he hadn’t come in time to save her brother. When Mary arrived, she, too, voiced her disappointment. Then, incredibly, Jesus prayed to His Father, and Lazarus was brought back to life. Both of his sisters had missed the fact that in the waiting was where the miracle was hidden. What are you waiting on? Don’t despair; Jesus is coming. He’s in the waiting.