Waiting

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WHEN GOD’S TIMETABLE DIFFERS

In pioneer missions, waiting on God—not seeing immediate results or progress—often becomes the core test of faith. This challenging season reveals our deep desires for control while underscoring that the nature of mission work is long, uncertain, and often marked by stretches of silence and delay. The reality is that waiting is not an interruption; rather, it is a central, God-ordained element where spiritual growth and mission advancement are forged. Our response in these times shapes both our faith and the future of our ministry.

Anna, a missionary in a remote village, had spent five years learning the local dialect and building relationships. She had shared the gospel countless times, but it felt like her words simply dissolved into the dusty air. No one seemed to grasp the concept of a personal God, let alone their need for salvation. Her days were a monotonous rhythm of language drills, tending her small garden, and sitting with women as they wove rugs, listening to their stories. She yearned for a breakthrough, a single disciple, but God seemed silent. One afternoon, watching an elder repair a broken loom, Anna understood. The elder explained, “You cannot rush the thread, child. You must wait for each one to find its place.” Anna realized her waiting was like the weaver’s—slow, patient, and essential for the tapestry God was creating. She continued working and waiting, trusting that God was weaving His story in His time.

BIBLICAL REFLECTION ON WAITING

Waiting is not passive but an active posture of faith. The mission field, with its complexities and divine timing, often demands this posture. A biblical theology of waiting helps cultivate hope and combat discouragement.

God created time, but He isn’t limited by time. God is not a being within time, but the timeless Creator of time. He stands outside of it, yet actively interacts within it, orchestrating His purposes from eternity past to eternity future. Time, as we experience it, is a dimension of creation that God brought into being. It began with His act of creation. (Genesis 1:1; John 1:3; Hebrews 11:3) God’s existence is not bound by the chronological progression of moments. He is eternal, existing outside of and transcending the timeline He created. (Psalm 90:2; Isaiah 57:15; 2 Peter 3:8; Revelation 1:8; Ephesians 1:4) 

Humans are limited by time. In stark contrast to God’s eternal nature, we are finite beings, utterly limited by time. Our lives are brief, fleeting, and ultimately temporary, a reality that calls for humility and a focus on eternal matters. (Psalm 90:10; 39:4-5; 103:15-16; James 4:14; Job 14:1-2; Genesis 6:3) 

God appoints a time for everything. We live by our own calendars, but God, the timeless Creator, has already appointed a time for everything in His perfect plan. He’s not limited by our clocks, our schedules, or our frantic need for control. He has total, sovereign control, orchestrating every single event from our birth to our death, and every moment in between. (Psalm 139:13-16; Acts 17:25-31; Hebrews 9:27-28)

God waits, too. While God created time and is not limited by it, God patiently waits, demonstrating His long-suffering, His perfect timing, and His sovereign control over all events and history. From our limited perspective, God’s waiting can feel prolonged, but from His eternal viewpoint, it is always purposeful and precise. He is never late. (Isaiah 30:18; 2 Peter 3:8-9; Romans 9:22; Genesis 6:3; Habakkuk 2:3)

Humans naturally wonder about the length of time. Since we do not know what God’s appointed times are, it is only natural for us to wonder and ask God ‘when’ or ‘how long’. (Psalm 119:84; 6:3; 13:1-2; Acts 1:6-7)

Waiting is the normal path of most biblical characters. In some ways, the Bible’s title could be The Great Wait. The cast of characters could be the Great Waiters. Their story isn’t about their hurriedness, but about their endurance. Noah waited hundreds of years for the rain while building the ark. Abraham waited twenty-five years for God to give the promised heir through Sarah. (Genesis 12-21) Joseph unjustly languished in jail for more than two years before God moved him to the palace. (Genesis 39-41) Moses waited in the wilderness for 40 years only to see the Promised Land. Twenty-five years passed between Samuel’s anointing of David to be king. (1 Samuel 16-22) Daniel waited through the night with a den full of lions. Paul waited years in various prisons. And even Jesus waited 30 years to begin His ministry.

Waiting is an act of surrender. Waiting is a core part of the Christian life, designed by God to show us our own limitations and His boundless power. In seasons of delay, we’re forced to move the doctrine of God’s absolute sovereignty from a theological concept we merely believe in our heads to a living, breathing reality we embrace in our hearts. We surrender to the fact that God alone can save, and His purposes alone cannot be thwarted. Ultimately, we are waiting on God to move more than the answer. (Job 42:2)

“Do you know why few of us like to wait? We don’t like to wait because waiting immediately reminds us that we are not in charge. Nothing more quickly offends our delusions of self-sovereignty than being forced to step out of our own schedules and wait for another. Think about it. You have never gotten angry because you have had to wait for you! Only when my heart is progressively in awe of the agenda of One vastly greater and wiser than me will I surrender my schedule to him and be willing to wait for others.” ― Paul David Tripp, Awe

Waiting is a form of longing. Waiting is a deep, gnawing ache for things in the world to be set right—a longing for justice, for deliverance, for God to act. And this kind of deep longing is always accompanied by a season of waiting. The intensity of that longing isn’t just determined by the length of time, but by the very thing we are waiting for (most often, Who we are waiting for). As we wait for God, we hope, we grow in joyful anticipation, confident expectation, like longing for Christmas to come. (Psalm 130:5-6; Romans 8:19, 25)

Waiting isn’t doing nothing, but it is confident expectations. Waiting equals hoping in the Lord. While we are waiting, the Lord is forming our character. In the waiting, we are becoming someone different from who we are now, forged in the furnace of delay. And as that happens, we find that our expectations of what we are waiting for are also shaped. (Psalm 27:14)

  • While we wait, we work. While Noah waited for the rain, he built a boat. While Joseph waited in prison, he interpreted dreams. As Daniel waited, he prayed. Likewise, Job, David, Paul, and even Jesus waited patiently and began the ministry God called each of them to do, serving people around them. There is always work to be done while we’re waiting.
  • Waiting is an active posture of faith. Patient endurance, hopeful expectation, and continued obedience while God works in His perfect timing are all used to stir our faith. On the mission field, waiting is an important piece of the fabric of our faith. (Psalm 37:7; Isaiah 40:31; Lamentations 3:25-26)

Waiting despite being misunderstood. Sometimes waiting takes courage and faith especially when others misinterpret your perceived inaction as idleness or inadequacy. JThis decision perplexed his disciples and led to understandable frustration and anger from Martha and Mary (John 11:1-37). Yet, Jesus was operating on the perfect timing of the Father, ensuring His glory would be revealed (John 11:4). To those observing, our faithful waiting may appear foolish or even irresponsible, but we must trust the sovereign plan unfolding in God’s time.

Waiting is a normal part of the mission. There is a “Not Yet” reality to mission work. Waiting is not a detour from the mission but often the very path God ordains for its advance. We live in the “already, but not yet” tension of God’s Kingdom, where ultimate fulfillment is promised but not fully realized.

  • We Wait for God to Work: Recognizing that ultimate transformation, open doors, and spiritual breakthroughs are God’s work, not ours. (1 Corinthians 3:6-7) 
  • We Wait for the Salvation of the Lost: Spiritual eyes being opened is often slow, requiring years of patient presence, prayer, and proclamation before a response. (2 Peter 3:9)
  • We Wait for Disciples to Grow in Their Faith and Walk: Sanctification is a lifelong, often messy process, requiring patience with new disciples’ struggles and slow progress.  Delay never pauses God’s purpose; it merely polishes His instrument. (Philippians 1:6; 1 Thessalonians 4:3)
  • We Wait for Team Members and Resources: Building healthy teams, securing visas, raising support, and receiving necessary supplies often involve frustrating periods of waiting. (Philippians 4:19)
  • We Wait for God’s Timing and Open Doors: Plans may be hindered, doors may close, requiring us to wait for God to reveal His next step. Paul’s plans were diverted, leading to the Macedonian call, but only after being “kept” by the Spirit. (Acts 16:6-10) 

Our smaller moments of waiting point to the ultimate wait. We join the chorus of the heavenward groaning of all creation as we wait for eternity and the second coming of Jesus. When Jesus returns, the “not yet” will crumble into the “already”, and there will be no more waiting for an answer to desperate prayers. In the end, we ultimately wait for Someone rather than waiting for something. (James 5:7-8; Romans 8:24-25; Matthew 25:1-13; 2 Thessalonians 2:1-3)

  • What other Scriptures or biblical aspects come to mind when you consider “waiting”? Take a few moments to look up a few of these verses and journal what the Lord highlights for you.

“Wait for the LORD; be strong and take heart and wait for the LORD.” — Psalm 27:14

THE IMPORTANCE OF WAITING ON GOD

God actively uses seasons of waiting as a crucible for spiritual formation, refining our character and deepening our dependence on Him. If we fail to focus on the true worth of these long waiting seasons and aren’t prepared to wait well, we won’t just be caught off guard; we’ll actually waste our waiting.

Cultivates Forbearance: Waiting directly combats our natural impatience and desire for immediate gratification. We can’t, actually, see all that God might be doing when He calls us to wait. We’re standing on the underside of the tapestry, seeing only the knots and tangled threads. There is a bigger picture to our waiting.

Builds Trust: When we wait, we are forced to trust God’s character and timing, even when we don’t understand. It’s not easy to wait when it feels like God should act now. Faith is  “the conviction of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen”? (Hebrews 11:1).

Fuels Prayer and Worship: God is not just what we wait for, but who we wait for. This reality compels our worship and fuels our persistence as we seek, ask, and knock. Even when there’s too much to do, and our to-do list screams for our attention, praying is never a waste of time. In both the doing and the waiting, we worship God.

Refines Character: It exposes idols of control, efficiency, and self-reliance, fostering humility, perseverance, and contentment. For “fixers” and “time wasters” alike, waiting has a unique, internal work—it’s in that tension that we are shaped and changed.

Increases Spiritual Sensitivity: In stillness, we often become more attuned to God’s voice and subtle leading. Our joy also becomes anchored to the present rather than constantly untethering to the next best thing. (Philippians 4:11)

Examples of Waiting on the Mission Field: 

Preparation. Think of all the waiting you did before going to the field. Waiting to go. Waiting for funds and support. Waiting for training and requirements to be met. It was all preparation to go to the field and wait some more.

Language Acquisition: Years of daily study and practice before fluency is achieved, with many plateaus.

Visa and Legal Processes: Months or even years of waiting for paperwork, interviews, or approvals, often with no clear timeline.

Relationship Building: Investing years in consistent presence and friendship before any spiritual openness, responses, or trust emerges.

One laborer reflected on this, “I had no idea waiting would be such a consistent part of “M” life when I first came. When I arrived, I don’t think I was mentally prepared for the amount of waiting for both the things that feel more monumental in missions life, or for the daily waiting on neighbors as their schedules and ways of looking at time were so different from my own. Both the big and small waits were/are sanctifying and deeply transformative for me. Waiting as a way to honor and show love to neighbors keeps coming up as I consider the topic of waiting. It shows you value the relationship more than your own agenda and is probably one of the most common ways I wait in the field in daily life–the day-to-day very un-newsletter-worthy waiting that feels unglamorous and yet powerfully used by God in my life.”

Salvation of Souls: Laboring for years or decades without seeing a single disciple and then waiting years for another.

Team Formation: Waiting to mobilize teammates to join the team, or for existing team members to become established.

Project Approval and Funding: Delays in securing permission, growing finances for ministry initiatives, and fortifying the support base.

Discipleship Growth: Patiently walking alongside new disciples as they slowly shed old habits and grow in their faith, often with many setbacks.

Strategic Direction: Waiting for God to reveal the next step or open a specific door after a season of closed opportunities.

PRAYER ACTION

Consider the Scriptures you cling to above. Consider waiting. Write a prayer for the kind of person you want to be while you wait on God.

REFLECTIONS ON BUILDING A PRACTICAL MINI-THEOLOGY OF WAITING

Take some time to prayerfully draft your practical mini-theology of “waiting” by responding to these questions:

  • What does it mean to wait on God? What does it look like to wait on God, especially on the mission field? How long am I expected to wait on God?

example: God is… We are the kind of people who… It is most like us/me to… We/I will… We/I hold to…

  • What am I to do while waiting on God? What makes waiting tough? What does God do within you in the waiting?
  • Why is the mission mostly about waiting? How is the waiting worth it?
  • Once you finish, share your responses with your mentor. Ask for feedback. Adjust your draft as needed.
  • Complete a one-page practical mini-theology.

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