Right now, my life is in this constant stage of waiting. I’m waiting for May 6 because I’ll finally be done with college (for now!). I’m waiting for the first week of July because I’ll be back at GMBA camp with all my out-of-state friends and family. I’m waiting to move out, to buy a new car, and to find the person I get to spend the rest of my life with. I’m waiting.

The difficult thing about waiting is that I live in a society where everything is instant. If I hear a song on the radio and like it, I buy it on my smartphone and play it in a matter of minutes. If I don’t know the answer to a question, I ask Siri or Google it and get the answer immediately. If I find something I like, I can buy it with one click on Amazon, and two days later it comes in the mail. Patience is hard to practice when I live in a world of instant gratification.

Recently, I had a conversation with a friend from church about a situation I’m in that requires a ton of patience. I needed some advice because I felt like things weren’t going the way I wanted them to go. This friend said something to me that stopped me in my tracks and shook me with conviction. He said, “God is amazing at setting things into their proper place. We just have to give Him the chance to do it and not try to do it ourselves. It is a form of pride when we rush God. Faith is the ultimate weapon against impatience.”

It is a form of pride when we rush God.

Wow. I had to stop and think about this for a second, and I realized just how often I let my pride get in the way of me and God. Most of the time, being human, I’m so quick to count all of my successes as my own, but really, everything I have is because God has given it to me. He is so present in my life that even if it feels like nothing is working or things are not falling into place, He has carried me this far and will continue to carry me through the rest of my journey. In all honesty, if it starts to feel like things aren’t working, then it’s probably just me trying to do things on my own again! I need to practice patience and have faith in the blessings that will eventually come.

The Bible is full of examples about waiting on blessings. Jacob worked for seven years to marry Rachel and ended up working an additional seven years because Laban tricked him into marrying Leah. Abraham and Sarah were almost 100 years old when God blessed them with a child. As much as I try to figure out where my life is going next and as much as I attempt to do things by myself, I have to remember that my life is not my own. If I put my trust in the Lord, then everything will work out.

Jacob worked for 14 years because he had faith that it would pay off in the end, and it did. Even though Abraham prayed for a child and was blessed with a son, he was willing to sacrifice his only son because his faith in God was so great. I’m still trying to learn how to have faith that God has everything already figured out. I’m learning to be patient like Jacob and to have faith like Abraham. It’s a process, but patience helps strengthen my faith. Patience and faith — you really can’t have one without the other. Even though it is difficult, I have to have faith and remember that God’s blessings will be worth the wait.

Psalm 27:14, “Wait on the Lord: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the Lord.”

Mosiah 24:16, “And it came to pass that so great was their faith and their patience that the voice of the Lord came unto them again saying: Be of good comfort, for on the morrow I will deliver you out of bondage.”

This article has undergone ministry review and approval.