Waiting on God

My three year old daughter prayed for me today. Here's how it all went down:

Anna: Why are you coughing daddy?
Me: Because I'm sick.
Anna: Did Abraham (my son) make you sick?
Me: I think so.
Anna: Why are you sick?
Me: I think Abraham made me sick.
Anna: How come? Did God make you sick?
Me: Anna, do you want to pray for me?
Anna: Ok.

She prayed a sweet simple prayer of faith as only a three year old can pray:

"Dear God, thank you for the father, thank you that you made us and take care of us, help daddy feel better. In Jesus' name, Amen."

About thirty minutes later:

Anna: How come you're still coughing dad?
Me: Because I'm sick Anna.
Anna: But I prayed for you!
Me: Oh Anna, when we pray we have to wait for God. We don't tell God what to do when we pray, we ask him to help us in the way that is best for us and sometimes that means that God will do something in our lives that we don't even understand.
Anna: Oh, ok.

I have to admit that I can identify with Anna's frustration. I often wonder what God is doing with my prayers. I am constantly tempted to treat God like an almighty butler who is sleeping on the job. The problem with looking at God like a lazy butler is that this puts us in the awkward, ridiculous, and ultimately disastrous position of managing God. So when God is slow to answer our prayers we naturally think of how we can manage him better.

We may try to manage God by "motivating" God into answering our prayers: "O, God if you hear my prayer I will give you a big bonus in my obedience! I will live for you and glorify you and serve you! I will be good to my wife and children. I will try really really hard to get to church on time."

Or we may try to manage God by "threatening" God into answering our prayers: "God please show me that you are real by hearing my prayer. I'm finding it hard to believe in you. Please show me that you exist by confirming what an important person I am."

Looking at God like a lazy butler will destroy our prayers, in fact it will destroy us altogether. Prayer like this is really not prayer at all, it is management; and it will leave us tired, worn out, disappointed, frustrated, bitter, self-righteous, and feeling condemned. This kind of faith in God is really not faith in God at all. It is faith in ourselves, and it will cut us off from the source of life, leaving us defenseless to stand judgment before him without representation.

The Good News of the Bible is not the message of a God who waits on us (like a butler); it is the message of the joy we can find in waiting on God.

Waiting on God means that when we have no hope in ourselves, we can still hope in God. Waiting on God means that when our lives don't make sense, we trust that God is still wise (his understanding is unsearchable). Waiting on God means that even when we feel like fainting from weariness, we trust that God will renew our strength with perpetual life and vigor: we will run and not be weary, walk and not faint.

The Good News is that this eager expectation that we can have in God is itself a free unmerited gift from God; for we can wait, trust, and hope in all these things because of Jesus alone. Because we who trust in Jesus have been freed from the law of sin and death, we can wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies, and wait for it with patience.