“Make sure that you remain diligent while you are waiting for Me to move on your behalf. Your time of waiting is also a time of learning to be obedient in other areas of your life. Complete those things that I have told you to do. Clean up all of the relationships that have been neglected. Become a study of Jesus. Learn about My heart. Bring your house to order so that new assignments can be completed when I give them to you.

"Few understand the importance of waiting on Me. I am not only completing patience, diligence, and obedience in you; I am orchestrating many things concerning your life. As soon as everything is in order, you need to be ready to move. There will be work to be done. Prepare while you can. When I call you, I will expect immediate responses. A work of completed patience will bring new faith in Me. Soon you will walk in it.”

Psalm 51:10 AMP

Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right, persevering and steadfast spirit within me.

Psalm 106:12-15a AMP

12) Then [Israel] believed His words [trusting in, relying on them]; they sang His praise.

13) But they hastily forgot His works; they did not [earnestly] wait for His plans [to develop] regarding them.

14) But lusted exceedingly in the wilderness and tempted and tried to restrain God [with their insistent desires] in the desert.

15a) And He gave them their request, but sent leanness to their souls…

Isa. 30:18 NIV

Yet the LORD longs to be gracious to you; he rises to show you compassion. For the LORD is a God of justice. Blessed are all who wait for him!

Acts 12:6 NIV

The night before Herod was to bring him to trial, Peter was sleeping between two soldiers, bound with two chains, and sentries stood guard at the entrance.

The picture of Peter shackled to two soldiers and possibly snoring up a storm while waiting for the Lord to move on his behalf is probably one of the most descriptive heart positions of trusting in God ever written. It is a delightful picture of absolute trust in a faithful Father God. It can also, however, portray the wrong picture of what waiting for the Lord to move on our behalf is really all about. Yes, waiting on God most certainly accomplishes quiet, peaceful, steadfast patience in those who are waiting; but much more is also accomplished.

Waiting on God is never a time of sleeping the days away. In fact, it is the opposite of inactivity. Although the primary activity is always seeking the Lord diligently and repenting of revealed sins, especially those of faithlessness and control, many “clean-up” tasks are accomplished during these times.

Waiting is a time of both heart and physical preparation. It is a time of bringing proper order back to your spiritual and physical house. To wait on God is a settling in with the Lord, cleaning your ears so that you can once again hear Him properly, cleaning your house so that you can move when He tells you to move; and sharpening your tools so that you have what is needed for the important tasks ahead. Waiting for the Father to impart what is on His heart for your life imparts His life in the process.

Show me how to wait, Lord,

Jim Corbett