PRAISING AND WAITING

I have been reluctant to write this essay. Why? Well, it is about my gratefulness to the Lord, and I don’t want anyone to feel that the Lord thinks less of them because they haven’t received comparable blessings. And I know what that feels like.

However, it is good to give praise to the Lord:

• I will bless the Lord at all times; his praise shall continually be in my mouth. My soul makes its boast in the Lord; let the humble hear and be glad. Oh, magnify the Lord with me, and let us exalt his name together! I sought the Lord, and he answered me and delivered me from all my fears. (Psalms 34:1-4)

I tend to be very negative and skeptical, and so praise had been little more than an act of blind obedience. Praise-as-work (and not as-privilege) had been the result of decades of depression, later accompanied by devastating panic attacks, even as a believer. Even now, after the Lord has delivered me from so much, I am still saddled with a melancholic nature along with its negativity, both obstinately opposed to praise.

Yet negativity must give way to truth, as clouds eventually give way to the sun, as

skepticism surrenders to God’s love. Consequently, I now have to proclaim just a few of the many tokens of His faithfulness to me.

On three occasions, on a single trip overseas, we had left behind the small pack with ALL our valuables, once in a bus station, once on a park bench, and once at a hostel. On each occasion, they were miraculously recovered.

I cannot say why this might not have been your experience. However, I want to encourage you to keep trusting in the Lord. I had to. I had no other choice. I had suffered from crippling emotional problems for decades, even in the Lord. However, of late, after 43 years of following my Savior, He has been delivering me from their tormenting grasp.

Meanwhile, I have learned to accept the torment:

• The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit. Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers him out of them all. (Psalms 34:18-19)

Consequently, I am still waiting as we all must:

• Therefore the Lord waits to be gracious to you, and therefore he exalts himself to show mercy to you. For the Lord is a God of justice; blessed are all those who wait for him. (Isaiah 30:18)

The Lord also waits for us to learn key lessons (2 Corinthians 1:8-9). He has His own schedule:

• He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no might he increases strength. Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted; but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint. (Isaiah 40:29-31)