“Stay there in the questions, in the doubts, in the wonderings and loneliness, the tension of living in the Now and the Not Yet of the Kingdom of God, your wounds and hurts and aches, until you are satisfied that Abba is there too. You will not find your answers by ignoring the cry of your heart or by living a life of intellectual and spiritual dishonesty.” From Sarah Bessey’s Jesus Feminist: An Invitation to Revisit the Bible’s View of Women

So much of our lives are spent waiting. We wait in line, we wait in a drive-thru, we wait for a train, a bus, to graduate. We wait to find love, we wait for love to find us, we wait for test results. We wait to find out if we’re pregnant, we wait to find out the due date. Many times, we pray and it seems as if God doesn’t answer. But in the still quiet of his presence, he says, “Wait.”

We don’t want to wait.

We have smart phones so we don’t have to wait to get to a computer. We buy instant dinners, instant coffee, and when we go to a restaurant we expect instant service.

Why does God make us wait on Him? Why does He, in His heaven, who can change us in a blink of an eye, make us wait for answers? Is he too busy? Are our requests too many for Him?

We are not the only ones to ask these questions, and God is big enough to handle it. It’s ok to question God, and it’s often a reflex reaction whenever really bad things happen to us. When we miscarry. When a child is sick and the answers are not coming. When marriages dissolve. When loved ones die suddenly. When we hurt and grieve, crying out to God, who seems silent.

God has not promised us a life without pain, grief, and death. He has only promised us that He is with us, and with Him comes the light.

Even in the waiting.