My dad wrote a blog recently talking about the anticipation of God doing something miraculous in our lives and brought up the story of Lazarus.
I want to talk about something that He has been working on in my life that goes along side of anticipation.
Patience.
We’ve all heard that patience is a virtue. We all know that patience is a gift of the Holy Spirit. But how often do we know that God is doing something and we get impatient with God.
Why aren’t you doing anything!? You know what’s going on! Do something! I wish God would hurry up and do something. Don’t you care?
It tells a lot about ones faith when this comes up.
On that day, when evening came, He said to them, “Let us go over to the other side.” Leaving the crowd, they took Him along with them in the boat, just as He was; and other boats were with Him. And there arose a fierce gale of wind, and the waves were breaking over the boat so much that the boat was already filling up. Jesus Himself was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they woke Him and said to Him, “Teacher, do You not care that we are perishing?” And He got up and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, “Hush, be still.” And the wind died down and it became perfectly calm. And He said to them, “Why are you afraid? Do you still have no faith?” They became very much afraid and said to one another, “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey Him?” (Mark 4:35-41 NASB)
When Jesus leads us into seasons of uncertainty in our lives, do we trust Him with anticipation or do we fear the storm in our worry?
The disciples had to learn that a bigger storm was coming. One that they couldn’t handle on their own. They had to know that Jesus can calm the storm and that they can wait with anticipation as to what Jesus is going to do in their lives.
Can we learn this lesson from their example or do we need to learn it the hard way?