The Right Train of Thought

"Wait and hope for and expect the Lord; be brave and of good courage, and let your heart be stout and enduring. Yes, wait for and hope for and expect the Lord." (Psalm 27:14, Amplified  Classic)

Every day, huge and pretty scary issues occupy the headlines. Troubling, yes. But what is strange is that, when the Maker of the universe is living on the inside, there is often this peaceful current flowing beneath the turmoil that says to the soul, "God's got this. This is the day the Lord has made, so rejoice and be glad in it."

It has nothing to do with being oblivious to the reality of things, or not praying about them, and everything to do with that mysterious heaven-sent kryptonite known as "waiting" on the Lord—a reverential trust that the God who made you and everything else is enormous in goodness and presence; He sees, knows, understands, and is not preoccupied with something or someplace else.

So, why is it that the weight of the little things in the everyday life, not the huge and pretty scary world issues, can cause a weariness that can prompt temptations of pulling off the Highway of Holiness to some side road to see where that might lead? Whether it is a fear of the unknown, of a tough decision to be made, of a bill to be paid when resources are low, or that a wounded moment of the past is beyond repair, these and many more relatively little things can loom larger than North Korea because they not only hit close to home, the lies and accusations and doubts try to break in and raid our spiritual and emotional refrigerator of all resources of sustenance.

And yet, the Psalmist sings it again:

"Wait and hope for and expect the Lord;

be brave and of good courage, and let your heart be stout and enduring..."

Because even when it feels like your refrigerator of hope is being raided, it's good to know that God is enormous in goodness and presence in every circumstance, that waiting doesn't mean doing nothing, and that in God's economy, it looks much more wonderfully active than we could imagine...

..."Think of waiting for a train. When you wait you may be still, standing or sitting, but you are not passive. You are watching, listening. Your eyes follow the parallel lines of the tracks into the distance looking for the train to come chugging in. You listen for the roar of the engine, the clanking of the cars, and the tones of the train’s whistle. Even as your body rests on the platform your senses are alert and your mind active. This is what it should be like to wait on the Lord too. Sometimes it is stillness, but in the stillness there is alertness and heightened sensitivity."—Barnabas Piper, from "Patience Isn't Passive"

To which the Psalmist might point forward to a prophet's familiar words of encouragement this day, and for Monday and the ones to follow, to be read and absorbed as if for the first time—the right train of thought—whether the "waiting" is for stuff close to home or on the world stage:

"The everlasting God, the creator of the whole world, never gets tired or weary...God strengthens the weary and gives vitality to those worn down by age and care. Young people will get tired; strapping young men will stumble and fall...but those who trust in [wait on] the Eternal One will regain their strength.They will soar on wings of eagles. They will run—never winded, never weary. They will walk—never tired, never faint."  (Isaiah 40:28-31, The Voice translation)