Dealing With God's Delay

“Dealing with God’s Delay”

By

Pastor M.L. Maughmer, Jr.

OPENING:- How many have heard this before:- God’s delay doesn’t mean God’s denial!

Just because God hasn’t done something yet doesn’t mean that He won’t do it at all! We need to just wait on God. The Bible says in Isaiah 40:31 “But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew [their] strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; [and] they shall walk, and not faint” There are benefits for waiting upon the Lord. Nevertheless, one of the hardest things to do in life is wait on God. We understand that God has a will for our lives. We also know that God answers prayer. But understanding the principle is one thing being able to apply that practice in our daily living can be down- right hard at times. However, how we deal with God’s delay is paramount in receiving the blessings of God.

Understand that God’s love is unconditional, but all of His blessings are based on conditions! EXAMPLE:- Matthew 6:33 “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you”. If you want to receive all the things (blessings) you must first meet the requirement of seeking first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness. That is practice and principle in action.

Sadly one of the greatest tragedies in life is to lose focus of God and His plan for our lives while we are to be waiting on Him. Jeremiah 29:11 says “For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the LORD, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end”. Understand that God has a purpose and God has a plan for us and He has all the details already figured out. If we focus on our sorrows, our losses, our temporary setbacks, our momentary depressions, and our valley experiences and forget that all things work to the good of them that love the Lord to those that are the called according to His purpose. Then we miss the value of understanding what God has for use to comprehend. Paul said in Philippians 4:11 “for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, [therewith] to be content”. Joseph understood that for in Genesis 50:20 he said “But as for you, ye thought evil against me; [but] God meant it unto good, to bring to pass, as [it is] this day, to save much people alive”. His brothers sold him into slavery because the hated him, but God used that situation because he was going to put Joseph in a place that would deliver those that misused him. God’s plan for Joseph was to be in Egypt in position and power for the purpose He planned.

We must understand that sometimes God allows us to go through things because it is in His plan for us to bring us to that expected end.

The problem is that we are human and we deal within time and God is Divine and transcends time. Because we deal inside of time we don’t handle the movement time with much patience. When I mention the movement of time I am talking about the measure of durations of events and the intervals between them, example:- from past to present to future takes a lifetime for us, but for God He transcends time, He stands outside of time and knows the beginning from the end because He sees all at the same time.

We have become so accustomed to instant everything that if something takes a little time we don’t want to deal with that. We now live in an instant world.

We have instant banking, instant cinema, and instant music.

We have instant coffee because we don’t have time to wait for the water to boil.

We have instant breakfast that we can make in the microwave instantly because we don’t have time to sit down to the most important meal of the day.

We have instant messages on our computers and text messages on our phones because we don’t want to take the time to talk to people if we can avoid it.

We have ATM machines that allow us to get money instantly.

We have the internet that affords us the ability to have unlimited access to information on any subject in an instant.

Everything is done in a hurry. We have Instant relationships, Instant marriages, and Instant divorces.

People say I need instant gratification.

I want instant answers to problems.

We are like the rabbit in the Alice in Wonderland story that said “I’m late, I’m late for a very important date no time to say hello goodbye I’m late I’m late I’m late”.