The Six Requirements for Waiting on God

Proverbs 4 says, “Be careful what you think because your thoughts run your life.” Are your thoughts helping you or hurting you? Start thinking power thoughts, victory thoughts. You’re choosing which direction your life is going to go. Pay attention to what you’re dwelling on. Don’t just think any thought that comes to mind. If it’s negative, discouraging, fearful, don’t give it the time of day. Turn it around and dwell on what God says about you.

Let’s think about it for just a moment. What, what are the requirements for waiting upon God?
Because there are requirements. Well, the first one is this and that is I have to trust Him.
If I’m gonna wait upon God, I’ve got to trust him because my waiting is saying I’m trusting you, God that your timing is better than mine.
You know what? I do not know your time is always right.
And so I’m gonna trust you and I’m gonna wait till you give me permission to go there or do this or have that.
It isn’t that God’s trying to deprive us of anything.
He only wants what is best for us.
So it takes faith and what I mean by that is simply this.
Am I willing to trust God for his timing before I make a decision?
You say, well, how do you will, you know God’s time and he will show you what does he say?
Asking? It should be given you seeking, you should find knocking.
It shall be open to you that is God is willing to show you the truth.
If you’re willing to ask Him. Now, if you’re living in sin, disobedience to God.
You’re probably not gonna hear Him because you can’t hear him because you don’t think they wanna hear him.
But I’m talking about people who really truly want to do the right thing you want.
What’s best for you, for your family decisions that you have to make.
It takes faith to wait upon God because trusting Him doesn’t mean I’m gonna get what I want when I want it.
Trusting Him says, I believe that when the timing is right, God will provide what I’m asking Him for.
So would you say that you have the faith to wait upon God when you come to a decision in your life?
A major decision? It takes faith to wait because we think, well, if I don’t get it now, what I won’t get it if I don’t do it now, it won’t be done.
Let me ask you a question. Is there anything too hard for God? No.
Can’t God control any and every circumstance, if God tells you to wait, do you think that something’s gonna slip out from under God’s care?
No. If, if we’ll stop and think the power of God, the wisdom of God, the love of God, the knowledge of God, we’re not gonna miss anything we ought to have by waiting upon God.
If God doesn’t provide something that you’ve asked for and you are trusting Him, it’s because you either don’t need it because it’s not good for you or it’s not the right timing it all boils down to this.
Do I trust him or do I? Not a second thing that is required of us?
And that is simply patience. In the 37th Psalm.
Listen to this three times in the 37th Psalm.
He says, beginning in verse one, do not fret, second times.
He says, rest in the Lord, wait patient for him.
Do not fret, third time, do not fret three times in that psalm.
He says, don’t fr that is, don’t allow yourself to be to get anxious about something when you can ask God about it.
Now, if I should ask you, do you believe God loves you? You would say yes.
What would you include in love when you include good advice, good guidance, provision, help strength, energy.
What when you, when you include those things in God’s guidance and love for you, yes, you would.
If you believe that God is who He says He is, you can believe that God will show you the right time to do anything and everything, the right time to make a purchase, the right time to go, the right time, to do this, the right time to have this particular job.
God’s timing is always perfect. Do I believe that He has our best interest at heart?
If I believe that I’m gonna wait but watch this.
Somebody says, I don’t have any time to waste. You never waste time waiting on God never.
You always find out that his timing is always the right time.
It takes faith, it takes patience, it takes courage.
And I love one of my favorite verses in the Bible is in this first chapter Joshua.
He says, have I not commanded you be strong and courageous, do not tremble or be dismayed for the Lord, your God is with you wherever you go.
And so if I’m gonna trust him, I’ve got to trust his time.
It takes courage to say no to, to offers.
For example, I remember on one occasion, somebody wanted to give me a very, very valuable piece of property and build me a house at no cost in a wonderful place.
I thought it was a great idea. I did.
And so uh we, we, we said about uh he, he just said, here’s the architect and y’all just design it, just design it the way you want it and here’s where we’re gonna put it, which was on a beautiful island.
And so naturally, I thought, well, Lord, you’re just blessing me.
And then when I got to praying, that’s not what I got.
Now, I got real encouragement from the person who wanted to do it and encouragement by the architect naturally.
And so uh the Lord and I had to talk about it and I wanted to know, well, why not?
Yeah, why not? And the Lord reminded me that’s not the right question.
The right question is if it’s my will and this is not a me, it’s not my will.
It looks right. It’s free, but it’s not my will.
And so you must say no, well, then I had to deal with that.
How do I tell my friend that I cannot accept something so valuable and beautiful and desirous.
And when I finally did naturally, he did not understand.
I said, well, the only thing I can tell you is this when God tells me not to do something, I’ve made enough mistakes in life to know He means exactly what he says.
And I cannot require of God to tell me why. Sometimes He’ll tell you why.
Sometimes he won’t. It was probably about six months later that I realized why now did I covered it all during that time?
No, I didn’t. I knew very clearly that God was saying to me, no, this is not my will.
It looks like my will, but it’s not. This is why listening to God is so very important.
And it’s why it takes faith, patience and courage to wait upon Him till we know His will.
Many things look like the will of God because oftentimes it looks like God just being good to you.
In other words, I couldn’t think of any reason not to accept something. Uh that was so desirous.
But finally, the Lord showed me, I didn’t have to understand why all I had to understand is whether I was going to be obedient or not.
God’s watches. God’s timing is perfect. It’s perfect.
It may appear to be late, but it’s perfect timing because God knows all of the avenues that affect us.
It takes faith, it takes patience, it takes courage, it takes determination to obey.
God takes determination sometimes because of all of the things that other people think and what they say and maybe their influence in your life and all the rest.
It takes determination to wait. Why are you gonna wait this?
This is the chance of a lifetime. Why are you gonna wait? Watch this carefully.
You say, why do you keep saying, watch this carefully because I want you to watch it carefully because it’s so very important.
Things may look exactly right. But something deep down inside of you who is the Holy Spirit is cautioning you.
Mm mm mm mm mm mm and watch this carefully.
If you don’t obey the healing of the Holy Spirit, he doesn’t get louder and louder and louder.
He comes on loud to begin with.
But because of your disobedience, you hear him less and less and less. Finally, you don’t hear a thing.
You have to determine, you have to determine to wait for God, especially when you’ve got lots of pressure on you.
You have to determine the way you got it. Everybody has an opinion about something.
So think about it, it takes faith, patience, courage, determination. And then it takes strength.
No, not moving until God says move, not making a choice until God says, make a choice.
It takes strength. And so we go to the scripture and who is the source of our strength?
Almighty God, Lord, if this is not your will give me the strength to say no.
And Lord give me the desire of my heart for you and for obedience. So strong.
I don’t want to do anything that brings about disobedience in my life. It takes strength to say no.
And especially if somebody is saying, oh, come on, come on, come on, come on. It’s gonna be ok.
And let me tell you what it’s gonna be ok.
Nobody can change the mind of God by telling you it’s gonna be ok.
And this is why you have to be careful.
It’s easier to listen to loud voices rather than the quiet whisper of the Holy Spirit.
He’s not gonna shout unless it’s so very important that God is not gonna put up with it and the, with his sovereign care and comes down so strong.
No. And God knows how to do that. So let’s go over them again.
It takes faith, patience, courage, determination, strength. And then the last one it takes is endurance.
You just have to hang in there and listen to people tell you why you should listen to people tell you why you should not endure.
That is you endure their suggestions, their influence their testimony or whatever it might be.
But you have to decide if you’re gonna be obedient to God or not.
Waiting upon the Lord is a lesson we learned.
And having heard this sermon, I pray to Almighty God.
You do not walk out of here and forget what you’ve heard.
If you do, you’re going to get in trouble.
The world’s full of trouble, the world’s full of offers people full of suggestions of how you ought to live your life and what you ought to do and what you should not do.
There’s only one ultimate supreme voice that you listen to. And that’s God.
If I’m gonna wait upon him and listen to him, it takes faith, patience, courage, determination, strength and endurance.
That means I’m willing to hang in there.
God with you, no matter what, until you show me what to do, obey God, leave all the consequences to him.
But a way up from the Lord until you know that you have heard what he requires of you.