Nehemiah Series - Preparing to Rebuild - Sermon 2

Are you Prepared to Serve?  Are you Prepared to Rebuild?  Are you ready to answer God’s call to build up what is torn down in your life, in your home, in your relationships, in our church, in our community? 

When God Waits

Close on the heels of my questions and wondering, I turned to the Bible to see what it says about the idea.  I typed the word “wait” into the search engine of my Bible software and eagerly scanned the verses to see if I could find one where God was waiting.  However, as I read verse after verse I became crestfallen.  It seemed there was no scriptural support for the idea of God waiting.  But then I found Isaiah 30:18 “¶ And therefore will the LORD wait, that he may be gracious unto you, and therefore will he be exalted, that he may have mercy upon you: for the LORD is a God of judgment: blessed are all they that wait for him.”  Huzzah!  There in the Bible I found a verse that said God waited.  My search was over.  Or was it?  Of course not.  I continued searching but I could not find any more verses that said God waited.  So I came back to this one and said, “Well, I’d better check the meaning of the word in Hebrew.  Maybe we translated it “wait” in English, but perhaps the Hebrew is more precise.”  I was relieved to find that the Hebrew definition also meant “to await: long, tarry, wait.”  But if this was the only verse in the Bible that says God waits, how was I supposed to fully understand God’s waiting?

THE PURPOSE OF SUFFERING

"My brothers and sisters in Christ, reckon it and count it all cheerfulness, calm delight, and exceeding great joy when you are surrounded and engulfed by many many many tests, adversities, and trials that prove you and test you; knowing and understanding that this testing and trying of your trustworthiness, faith, moral conviction, consistency, and entire reliance upon Christ for salvation accomplishes cheerful endurance, constancy, and patience.  Then hold onto that cheerful endurance and be held by it so that its accomplishing work may come to full maturity so that you also may reach full maturity and be complete and entire without blemish, lacking nothing: a completed masterpiece of God." James 1:2-4 (Pastor Rick's Version)