Is Waiting Brutal?

Hey dear readers👋

Happy new month! It's September and i am honestly grateful to be here, I hope you are too. It is always a blessing to be alive and see what God is doing on earth. Today I want us to talk about something i have never written about...something thats every believer's reality when we are walking with God,the wait...waiting seasons...the ins and outs of it...is it brutal? Is it long suffering? Is it a thorn in our flesh that we must endure? Is it even worth it or should we just give up praying about it... what does it mean to wait on God... how did we find ourselves in that position...why does God make us wait... Is it painful and shouldn't we give up at some point because come on? We worship the God of the universe the creator of heaven and earth and everything on it...who put the sun in the sky made the stars and the moon who created the world we live in... everything that takes our breathe away and that we call beautiful, God created it. He is the Creator and the only creator surely something as simple as answering my prayers should be quick...like the way he spoke during creation and it came to pass right? Well let's speak about it today...waiting. When God's answer to our prayer is not a yes or a no but a wait.

Before we dive in dear readers let me rebuke this lie that the enemy has woven in this world and even in the body of Christ that we can pray to the universe and it will grant us our blessings. That is a lie from the pits of hell and divination...the same as placing our identities based on stars or astronomy. It is one thing for the world to be deceived but it is another thing for the body of Christ to be deceived. If we truly carry the spirit of God in us...we need to pray that he may soften our hearts and grant us discernment. The enemy often comes as a friend or a wolf and deception will look so subtle you won't recognize it if you rely on your own ability. We need to get back to a place of prayer and humbling ourselves before God to help us discern lies from truth lest we fall. This thing irks me so much when i hear people saying "I believe the universe will answer me."The universe cannot talk! It is a created thing and we were given dominion over it. You were created in the image and likeness of God and when Christ died on that cross his blood became the covenant that sets us free from sin and death. We are no longer separated from God through him and in him...the charge Adam was given is now upon us who accept Jesus Christ as Lord and saviour. The Bible says creation is waiting in groaning for the revealing of sons of men. We were given dominion over this earth to steward it. Who we need to be praying to is God...not the universe. The universe cannot do anything for you...you are not it's servant you are God's servant. Let that be clear first and foremost. The universe is a created thing just like you and brethren you are not a thing but a being...with a body soul and spirit and that is why the enemy seeks to devour human beings. There is nothing in creation like us we are the only ones who were created in the image of God in his own likeness. We are image bearers of our heavenly father. He is a triune God three in one; God the father God the son God the Holy Spirit. In his eyes you are precious and you were meant to carry his glory. Walk like one, do not let the enemy steal your identity because that's what he seeks. You are not a slave but a child of God. In the richness of his glory he can bless you...from his hand to you...not through a universe but through his son Jesus Christ. He is the only way the truth and the life. I don't know who told you the universe can bless you because it can't...only God can bless you. Give him the glory due his name when he does. You are a child of God he delights in blessing you...go to him...he is the creator of the universe. You are his...not a pisces or a taurus or whatever you call yourself,you are a child of God. That is your identity. That's what identifies you from this world. What makes up who you are. We need to go back to a place where we understand only God can define us. The one who created me who knew me before this world was formed and created me for such a time as this...who knew who he has called me to be before he placed me in my mother's womb. He is God Jehovah, there is no one like him and nothing besides him. Upon his altar nothing else can stand because everything else is of the minds of men but he alone is God. Nothing else can define you but the God of glory who created you. Do not let the enemy or the world deceive you,pray for discernment,pray for insight and wisdom from the Lord. He gives abundantly, you have the Holy Spirit in you and he will redirect your steps. Submit to him and he will guide you. He is holy and a jealous God one of his commandments is do not worship any other god but me...this shows me he knew there are other gods but they are powerless and cannot save. Only God can and he is the God of glory. Worship only him desire only him. Do not be deceived everything else is fleeting but He remains the same for evermore. He has given us his commandments revealed his nature to us...read his word and know him...the God you serve. Tell him,"God i want to know you" and i promise you he will reveal himself to you...seek him only him and he will reveal himself to us. He emptied himself and became man to save you and show you not even death can separate us...he rose from it to show us he has all the power. Choose him because he has already chosen you and called you his own. He has told us that if we seek him we will find him,if we obey his commandments he will bless us abundantly ,if we seek him and his righteousness everything else will be added unto us and his word is living and active he is no man that he can lie. Throughout his word you will see the consistency of his nature through thousands of years. Why would we think he will start now? Why would we think he is not enough in himself? That praying to him and giving him our petitions is enough...that we do not need any other pathway to him...he has given us the authority to come directly to him through Jesus Christ and given us a seat at his table. The throne of grace is always before us and our high priest is always sitting upon it waiting for us to come to him...why are we busy looking for other things which cannot give us what we are seeking. God can and will bless you. The only thing he requires of his children and we can see in his word is our obedience, surrender and faith.

Another thing am afraid i need to mention is we seek the hand of God but not his heart...we do not want him but desire his blessings. We seek him without repentance and that is dangerous because God blesses all his children even the wicked. We miss out on his presence and the glory when we do not search his heart. The presence of God is everything we need. A touch of his glory will change your life for the better...I pray every person with breathe in his lungs gets to experience it. It is everything...one encounter with him and you will never be the same again...now imagine living life with his presence all through everything. He is everything you need. Seek him only him and everything else will be added to you.

That being said let's get to the meat of the article! I had to get that out of my chest and make it crystal clear the God I am talking about. Yeshua Jehovah the God of Israel,the omnipresent omniscient omnipotent God who is Alpha the beginning and Omega the end...the God who rose from the dead and is eternal the first and the last the living word the double edged sword the slain lamb the God who reigns forever on his throne with cherubims beside him singing Holy Holy Holy...who is who was and who is to come who is covered in glory, the all consuming God who separates seas and walks on water who stands mighty in battle at his sight demons flee nothing unholy can stand before him...the Lord who spoke and it came to existence who knows the end from the beginning the only God who raises the dead and gives sight to the blind. That is the God I am talking about. Deception has become so subtle sipping even in the body of Christ we forgot we are not from this world or of it. We are of God and his word is our only truth and anchor. We need to pray that our eyes are opened.

THE WAIT. The waiting season. I believe we have all gone through it at one point or another. I have said God delights in blessing his children. Don't for one minute think that you are not worthy of his blessings or lesser of his child. You are not,you are highly esteemed and precious in his eyes. Just because he has told you to wait or is delaying in blessing you does not mean he won't bless you. Trust me if he blesses even the wicked and makes it rain on their land he will bless you his dear child. All of his children in different ways and capacities have gone through the wait and are going through it. God has given each one of us the grace for this season because baby I don't think we can go through it in our own strength. That's impossible. Let's talk about it though, why does God make us wait. Today I was reading the story of Jacob and how he worked for fourteen years before he could have Rachel whom he loved dearly and still he waited. It must have been hard because he had worked the first seven years only to be deceived by his father in law Laban and given Leah instead...Laban told him to work another seven years to have Rachel and he obeyed him. Jacob then worked another six years before God permitted him to leave and go back to his birthland. A total of twenty years...those are the years he worked for his father in law who was a cheat and deceived him multiple times yet God gave him the grace to endure through it until he told him to leave. Twenty years Jacob worked faithfully and still he had to flee because his father in law was crafty and did not want to let him go. He knew his blessings had come through Jacob and clung on him but the Lord helped Jacob when his appointed time to leave came. He also blessed him abundantly when it was time to leave and promised to be with him. We know how Jacob was later named Israel and how God walked with the Israelites throughout their generations. A nation was birthed through this man who endured, preserved and remained faithful to God. The son of man came through his loins and just like God told Abraham, his descendants will be greater than the stars of the sky; so it came to be. Waiting...is it worth it? Yes it is worth it. I know it is worth it because the word of God shows me through every page how worthy it is to wait upon the Lord.

Is it brutal? Can we be honest with each other...yes it is brutal. Let's not sugar-coat, it is very brutal. If Jacob was to come today and we ask him how it felt being deceived by his father in law after seven years of toiling for him he will say it was hard. He won't sugarcoat it. In fact we can trust him to not sugarcoat it...the guy fought with an angel. He will say it was hard and he too wondered why God was not vindicating him. Twenty years of toil. It is not easy... neither is your suffering or mine. We want God to answer us and make the burden lighter. Waiting for him is brutal when we see him moving in other people's lives but ours. Yeah it's easy to throw stones and condemn people who are envious and jealous but I know if we look deep inside us and tell God to search our hearts...our brokenness and sinful nature will make us drop the stone and silence our tongue. I know i have wondered so many times why God is answering other people and passing me. I know I have seen people being blessed and thought when my turn will be...i know i have struggled with jealousy and it was never rooted from what my friends had but my own lack. My own need to have what I am praying for and not being content with God and what he has given me. The truth is we need to always pray that the Lord may search our hearts...we cannot in our own sinful nature know when seeds of sin such as pride envy jealousy greed gluttony or lust take root. In fact we are only tempted by our own desires God does not tempt because he himself cannot be tempted by sin. It is not in his nature. (Read James chapter one for more insight on this) God only tests. Without his spirit constantly searching our hearts to prune us and make us abide in him...our desires conceive sin and sin when it matures brings forth death. I will always tell you death spiritually is separation from God. We need him everyday otherwise sins like jealousy can cause huge damage in our lives other people lives just like any other sin. God is so gracious and it is okay if you have struggled with it do not feel condemned draw near to the throne of grace God loves you so much and he knows how deep the root is.

Waiting is brutal...these are some of the ugly emotions and feelings it arises. We wonder what we are doing wrong...why God is taking so long to bless us when we have seeked him faithfully. Why won't he give me a job...why won't he give me a partner who loves me...why won't he open my womb and grant me a child like he does other women...why won't he bless me financially when i keep hearing other people testify how they received a breakthrough financially...why won't he heal my body when he knows how the weight of this sickness has broken me to shreds...why won't he grant me peace in my family. Why...why... why. Yes you say he is a faithful God but he is not faithful to me.The one thing i am praying for dearly is the one thing he has denied me. We wonder why people run to witchdoctors,false prophets and false churches, astronomy and all kinds of false teachings...i think apart from ignorance and lack of God's knowledge and wisdom, there is a desperation where we seek answers and solutions to our problems. It is a heart that is longing for an answer and an end to all our problems and suffering. Outside the spirit of God, I promise you the enemy is seeking to devour you wholly when you are mostly vulnerable and needy. He will take any opportunity he can get. I know i say this alot but I will say it again. Seek God,seek his face diligently even if it means crawling back to him...pray without ceasing and pray specifically that the Lord may make you sensitive to the Holy Spirit. Pray that the Holy Spirit may have full authority over you...read your word stay rooted in the word of God... know God for yourself and his word. We are fighting a real enemy who will never stop pursuing you until you are dead. This is not a motivation speech or a cute advice,this is a matter of necessity and urgency to the body of Christ. Pray for all the saints too we need God to keep us in this race together because the goal is Zion. No soul should be lost.

I empathise with everyone who is in this season of waiting where you are waiting for God to move in your life and answer your prayer. In fact i desire to give you a long tight hug and cry with you because i am in that season too. Somethings I have waited for God to do for more than seven years and still it is yet to pass. Somethings are sooner yet highly urgent for his hand to make way before i pass out. Waiting is a different ballgame altogether in your walk with God because i promise you even though all of us have gone through it at one point or another...no one can truly be in your shoes. Only you knows how hard it has been and how many tears you have shed in your pillow when no one is watching. Only you know how much it has caused you to wait on God...the suffering and the cross you are bearing or have borne. Only you and God understand in depth what you mean when you say he has kept you. No one can actually understand the magnitude of what you mean and i am writing this with a heavy heart because i know just how much waiting on God can tear one's heart into pieces and have you doubting how God can be good when he doesn't feel good to you.

We talk about waiting and say stuff like have faith and rejoice in the Lord he will come to you. Take courage in him and trust me, God will come through for you and me. All this is true and necessary for us to overcome the suffering of waiting. But today let's speak about the brutality of it. When God gives you a word and takes long to fulfill it that it leaves you wondering if he really spoke it in the first place and if he will do it. Let's talk about the anguish and torment that comes when it feels like he is silent. Lets take off the coat and be bare admitting i am in fact weary. I am weary and i am losing sight of him. I am close to giving up on him and myself altogether. I am anxious and my thoughts have taken authority over me. I don't know how to wait in hope i have lost my faith in him. I have so many questions inside me i am angry at God and i feel like he has failed me. Take five minutes close your eyes and be honest with yourself and with God. Let it out don't hold it back...yes we want to rejoice but the anguish has its place in our heart we can't just ignore it. Show it to God...show him how broken your heart is how dark your mind is...it matters to him...you don't have to cry alone you don't have to bear this weight alone. It is heavy and the evidence of its weight is how weary your heart is. You don't have the strength to wake up in the morning and go through the day tell God. You cannot meet your needs financially and need him to move in haste tell him. You cannot get a job even though you have waited for so long, tell him. You cannot live another day and want to die by your own hand tell him. Your mind has become your prison tell him. Lift up your voice and cry to your father. Tell him everything because it matters and as someone who has been in the waiting and still is I promise you all these emotions are not unique to only you. We go through them so many times...we cry to a point you can't feel your voice and the heart gets numb. Don't let the enemy deceive you into thinking he has forgotten you...baby we have all in one time or another felt forgotten by God and it hurt. That hurt matters to God he cares, go to him...

Waiting is brutal and still God tells us to wait for him. To hope in him. For so long i always pretended i was waiting for him full of hope and energy. I had these prayers i had practiced in my head to tell God...but my heart was angry with God and weary. I was losing faith and i felt he had forgotten me or just didn't want to bless me. I kid you not i once asked God why he was stingy with his blessings...like i have to gravel so much to receive even an inch of your blessings and I still don't 😂 listen, i  know God understands just how dramatic i can be and i am so glad he still loves me. I for sure do not deserve it but oh the amazing grace! Let this be your sign reader that you can take any thought to God any feeling or emotion...he won't condemn you or cast you out...he won't view you differently in fact he will receive you with open arms as a father would and dissect the thoughts with you. You will be surprised to find out some thoughts are not even ours but the enemy's. I was pretending to be okay and gave God these cute practised prayers of "I trust in you my Lord." when in fact I don't until God told me to come to him when i am ready to tell him what i actually feel. I was astonished and defensive but broke down in seconds because he had come directly for my heart when it was so fragile. I didn't even tell him i just came undone and broke down. I can tell you this i have cried so much when in Christ than before him. Before him i used to numb and go on with life like nothing happened here in Christ i don't even know how to numb. He is always searching my heart I can't even bottle offence in it. Nothing...he comes for it and i just come undone. I remember wondering if i was actually a cry baby in denial because i never used to cry so much even as a child yet here in Christ i cry almost daily. I can literally watch a movie and cry... Jesus! I frankly hate crying but it is what it is...i need my lil cry with Jesus i guess.

I am getting off track where were we? Oh have you had your five minutes like i told you or are still trying to pretend you got it together? You will be surprised to find out you are just a cry baby like me who is still in denial... waiting will have you become a certified cry baby and that's okay. You know one thing i have learnt in this journey though? God will meet me exactly where I am. When i came undone before him and let it all out his power sipped through my mind and heart. He rested in me and when i was done crying I had this overwhelming sense of peace in me and around me. I began crying again from a place of father...dad i need you. I can't do this alone I don't have the will to...please carry me please take my feet off the ground and carry me I can't walk. You told me to do this...you called me on this journey when i gave you my yes i never knew just how much suffering Is connected to it and even though i want to trust it all works out for my good and your glory I don't have the strength to. It is too much. I can't wait on you anymore I feel you have failed me and won't answer me.  I had this reality in my heart that i wasn't supposed to walk through this alone and he wasn't calling me to be perfect or not to fall...he was calling me to know him. This wait was about him not me and the special work he is doing in me is to make me more like him. To conform me into his image...he is giving me an affection for him so that even when he blesses me i will be so immersed in the intimacy we share with him to be distracted by the blessing and idolize it. I will fall in love with his heart because he is revealing himself to me preserving me and preparing my hands for the glory he is pouring through me. His glory comes with his presence...it cannot come alone and for the presence of God to come before us he must consecrate us and our hearts because he is a Holy God. If we are to carry his glory we must carry his nature too. He cannot contradict himself even through us. We want the glory but dear reader it comes with a weight. The weight of it requires dependence on him to be able to carry it we cannot carry it alone. God needs us to be childlike in him because anything he calls us to do if it will have his presence in it we will need him to do it. A blessing is also a call to excellence and what sustains the sacredness of the blessing is his presence and our abiding in him. We need him to mould our character so that we can carry the blessing without compromise but dependence on him. The waiting is meant to birth this dependence...to remove the self sufficiency and the pride in us...to cultivate the fruit of long suffering in us and to make us more like him. He cultivates the fruits of the spirit and friendship in us every single time we choose to wait on him.

Believe this; He is good to you. God is for you and not against you. There is a powerful story he is writing for you and your testimony is so great it will uplift the hearts of so many children of God who will be going through the same or even more. Trust in him.

Know in your heart that God is a rewarder of those who diligently seek him and you will never see the righteous forsaken. Tell me any person in the Bible who walked with God diligently and God still forsook him at his hour of need? Tell me one person who God did not bless yet they walked with him and feared his name. He won't start now? He won't do it with you or me or any of us who is waiting on God. He heard you and he is coming to you. Take strength in him and in the strength of his might. He will never leave you nor forsake you no matter how brutal the season is no matter how impossible it looks...He is right there in the storm with you and he will not only calm the winds of your life but also hold you tightly in his arms dear child of God. He loves you so much, take rest in his arms because he has opened them for you. When the time is right he will cause it to pass in accordance to his will and he will do exceedingly abundantly above all you could ever ask think or imagine.

Be encouraged i am praying for you, pray for me too because i am in that season. I just wanted to share the little nuggets God has given me and also talk about the reality of waiting on God. He hears us and he will give us joy for every tear we have shed. He has said weeping may endure for a night but joy comes in the morning! Our stories and testimonies will be so great and he will use it to draw so many of his children to him all who are brokenhearted and weary to the throne of him who is the living water. I for sure promise I will come back here and share my testimony when he does it. I will share everything he does and all i have waited for. I hope you do too. Remember, we overcome the enemy by the blood of the lamb and by the word of our testimony.

 Grace to you dear reader...i love you but Jesus loves you more. I really hope from the bottom of my heart this article stirs your heart to go to him. Peace 🕊️

Allow me to leave you with this word that encourages me in this waiting season:

Lamentations 3:22-27

The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases,his mercies never come to an end. They are new every morning; great is thy faithfulness. "The Lord is my portion," says my soul "therefore I will hope in him." The Lord is good to those who wait for him, to the soul that seeks him. It is good that one should wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord. It is good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth.