Waiting

I'm not a patient person. I don't wait well.

However, I feel like I wait a lot.

To figure out a major. To graduate. To find that right person. To get married. To have babies. For those babies to be potty trained. For the first day of school. For the first day of summer.

To go back to work, now that all our kids are in school.

I've prayed about that last one for a couple of years.

Look, I know I am blessed to stay home. But it was a sacrifice to do so. And I don't mean just financially, especially in light of Bruce's recent pay cut. I sacrificed a big part of who I was when I stopped my career.

But now I'm someone different. And it's not about just me anymore. Journalism can wait. And it might not even be journalism that I go back to when I jump start a career again.

It's not even solely about Bruce and I as a couple anymore. New furniture can wait. Alone time will come more frequently again in the future.

For now, it's largely about three little people who we are responsible for nurturing in the best way that God has enabled us.

At Bible Study Fellowship recently our teaching leader said something that really hit me during lecture time. We've studied the life of Moses this year, and as the year wraps up, we're nearing the end of Moses' life. She pointed out that Moses didn't start slacking because of his age, or hanging up his responsibilities just because he had already accomplished so much. She said, "A person who serves the Lord is indispensable until the Lord says his task is done. You have no right to stop serving God in your current position until God makes it clear that it's time to move."

I have no right to stop serving God as a full-time mother to my children and as a full-time homemaking assistant to my husband... until God makes it clear that it's time to move.

And after praying for the past two years about going back to work, I think He's made it obvious that it's not yet time for me to move in that direction.

But I'm waiting on the answer to other prayers now. A big prayer that I've shared with only a couple of close friends. Prayers that concern my children's perception of the Lord. Smaller prayers even, about trivial things like where to vacation next summer.

Aren't we all waiting for the answer to some prayer?

Waiting does not mean we get to sit idly by. We still need to continue serving in the places God has placed us.

I don't want to stagnate. Or worse, move backwards.

I love this song by John Waller. (His voice is instantly recognizable to me because of another song of his that makes me weep each time I hear it... "Still Calls Me Son".)

This one is "While I'm Waiting."