True Love Waits on God
by G. Campbell Morgan
Things which eye has not seen and ear has not heard, and which have not entered the heart of man, all that God has prepared for those who love Him. — 1 Corinthians 2:9
G. Campbell Morgan once said, "Our God is marvelous in that He does marvelous things for those who wait for Him because they love Him." If you are like me, you find it terribly difficult to wait on God. I want to be busy doing something, anything for Him. But "God works for a waiting people, and they only fail when they try to manage without Him."
For those who thus wait, God works; and as surely as men wait for Him while He works for them, there will come to them, presently, the clarion call to arise and cooperate. When it comes, the plan is almost invariably a different one from that which had been expected. "In ways we looked not for," said the prophet, "Thou hast wrought for us in the past."
Is not that the history of every forward movement in the economy of God? A period of darkness, a period of desolation, a period of difficulty in which His people were brought to the point of knowing that they did not know and understanding that they could not understand. A period of being clever enough to be done with their own cleverness, and then, while they waited, a period of adjusting their lives to God, severing all ties that held them, abandoning all prejudices that paralyzed, putting an end to every effort that was likely to conflict with the practical definite command and program and plan.
When the call comes, it is almost invariably to something new and surprising and startling, in the doing of which we seem to have to go back upon things that we have said and done in the past. The peril of the people of God is always that they shall be so wedded to yesterday that they are no ready for God's tomorrow; or that they shall be so busy today making their programs that when God brings His program, their own arrangements interfere with the carrying out of His will.
. . . Waiting is far more difficult than working. . . . Waiting requires strength. It demands the absolute surrender of the life to God, the confession that we are at the end of our own understanding of things, the confession that we really do not see our way and do not know the way. . . . Isaiah said in effect, "God works for men that wait for Him"; Paul in effect said, "Marvelous things does God prepare for men that love Him." Love is confident in the authority; love is eager for the command; love rests in the wisdom of God; love is the alertness that waits and moves immediately. No fear of God will produce this waiting in the soul. . . .
. . . . God is surely acting in ways that we cannot see. . . . we affirm our faith that this is a day in which God is preparing for those that love Him, things that eye has not seen and ear has not heard, things that have never entered into the heart of man and which can only be interpreted by the Holy Spirit.
What, then, is our duty today? Our duty is to wait for Him. . . . seeking to be ready for God. That is the true attitude.
. . . . What, then, shall we do? Wait for God. Our activity must be that of setting our own lives in right relationship to Him. . . Waiting for God means being free and alert so that when the breath of God moves over us and the voice of God sounds, we shall be ready for departure along the new highway which He will mark out for us. While God works and we wait, He is preparing for a working in which we must cooperate. The new working of God will be revolutionary, the breaking up of our ideals, the scrapping of our mechanisms. Today we must get ready for this. If we are thus to wait for God, we must love Him as we have never loved Him. . . The central need of the moment is a new and passionate love for God, burning and flaming in His holy church. In proportion as that love comes, the church will be able to wait with the waiting that means alertness and readiness for service. Our love to God will be deepened by two things: a new and earnest cultivation of our fellowship with Him and a new and simple and definite obedience to Him.
How are we to cultivate our fellowship with God? By the contemplation of Christ. . . . The cultivation of God must be personal, it must be lonely, and it must be intense. It demands time, it demands effort, it demands endeavor. . . . In waiting upon God, we shall learn to love Him more, and by loving Him more, we shall be more perfectly prepared to wait for Him.
In proportion as we thus love Him and wait for Him, we shall be ready for whatever may be the plan of God in the days to come (The Westminster Pulpit, vol. ix, pp. 322-327).
For who has known the mind of the LORD, that he should instruct Him? But we have the mind of Christ (1 Corinthians 2:16).