Waiting is hard! You’ve surrendered to God and made great progress. You’ve left strongholds and struggles behind and you’re ready to do whatever He says. You have your plans and your timeline all figured out. But what happens when God says wait?
God had freed the Israelites from captivity and set them apart as His people. He promised to be with them on their journey and they were ready to go. They made a covenant with Him and promised to obey. They had seen what God would do for them, and they were all-in … or so it seemed.
Impatience leads to forgetfulness. Forgetfulness leads to idolatry.
When Moses went up to Mount Sinai to meet with the Lord, he left the people waiting at the foot of the mountain, and they got impatient and started to forget. They forgot about their promise to obey God. They forgot that none of the other “gods” they knew in Egypt had saved them or set them free. They forgot that it was Yahweh who brought them out of captivity. He was the One guiding and providing for their journey.
As soon as they weren’t sure where God was or what He was doing, they decided to go backward and make a god for themselves.
It seems silly considering all they had witnessed. It seems silly that after they had waited four hundred years as enslaved people in Egypt, forty days at the foot of a mountain was too long for them to bear.
They thought God had left, but He had not gone anywhere, and if He was testing their faith, they blew it! All they needed to do was look up and they would’ve seen the glow of God’s presence at the top of the mountain. But in their impatience, the Israelites made a golden calf and called it “god.”
Don’t give up and go back. Look up and stand firm!
It’s not hard to see ourselves in this story. We see God move in our lives, get excited, and go all in. Then God says “wait.” When the forward momentum stalls, we give up on God and search for something else to cling to. We forget He promised to never leave us and before we know it, we’ve returned to the same destructive strongholds from which He set us free.
If you are in a season of waiting and God seems silent, reflect on what He has already done in your life and believe that He is still at work. Seek Him more and wait expectantly for Him to act. Keep moving forward, one foot in front of the other, trusting that God will guide your way. He started a good work in you, and He will be faithful to complete it. Don’t give up and go back; look up and stand firm.
