God’s Thundering Silence

We also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope.
—Romans 5:3–4

Some of you are waiting on God to act. You have been asking God to reveal His will for your life or fulfill His promise to you, but you have only heard God’s thundering silence. So now you are thinking that God has forgotten all about you. He hasn’t. He knows exactly where you are right now. But God may have something He is doing in other people’s lives. He may be rearranging people and circumstances to bring about His will for you. And on a day that begins like any other day, God is going to come to you suddenly and dramatically and say, “It’s time.” Sometimes God is silent in your life because He wants to develop your faith.

What God does in us while we are waiting can be more important than what we are waiting for. You see, so many times we think that waiting is something we have to just endure until God finally gives us what we want. But it is during the waiting time that we become the kind of person God wants us to become.

We all know that in school, true learning comes, not from flipping to the back of the book to get the answers, but in going through the process and struggle of understanding how to arrive at the right answer. And it is the same way in God’s dealing with us. God is much more interested in what He is doing in your life than in giving you the answer He wants to give you.
Think about this for a moment: What are you asking from God right now that He couldn’t grant you immediately if He wanted to? It’s not that God is incapable. But God knows it is in the waiting that we will become the people He wants us to become. More than anything else, God wants to develop the quality of our faith. Hebrews 11:6 says that without faith, it is impossible to please God. What is faith? It is the assurance that God is going to do what He has promised to do. God wants to develop in you and in me the assurance that He can be trusted, that He is going to do what He has promised to do.

We cannot develop faith without waiting. Think about it: If God gave us immediately everything we ask for, where would our faith be? It is through the process of waiting that we develop faith. In Romans 5, the apostle Paul says, “Tribulation brings about perseverance; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope” (vv. 3–4). In his book Sabbatical Journeys, Henri Nouwen tells about a family of trapeze artists who told him about the crucial relationship that exists between the flyer and the catcher. They said there comes a crucial time in every trapeze act when the flyer lets go of the trapeze bar, arcs out into space, and then has to wait for the catcher to catch him. They pointed out something interesting: the flyer must never try to catch the catcher. Instead, he must wait in stillness for the catcher to do his work.

Some of you right now, reading this, have released the bar—you have let go and you are waiting on God to do something. God’s message for you today is this: “I will catch you. I will answer you in My way and in My time.”

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Today’s devotion is excerpted from “God’s Thundering Silence” by Dr. Robert Jeffress, 2008.
Scripture taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE®, Copyright © 1960,1962,1963,1968,1971,1972,1973,1975,1977,1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.

 

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