The Waiting Years

Well, hey everybody, it's great to see you whether you're here in the room or joining us online.

I'm honored to have you along for the ride.

And before we get to the important stuff, a little brief family update.

The journey of parenting is a journey.

Would you agree, parents?

Yeah.

So my wife and I, Sarah, we have four boys, and um, you know, they're great.

We love all of them.

Um, my youngest, uh, it was really interesting.

He all of a sudden has just decided he wants to be a golfer at 13, okay?

And I mean, I grew up on golf courses and I'm terrible.

Um, I went to golf camps and I'm terrible, okay?

Um, I golf maybe one time a year and I'm terrible.

But he decides he went on last Wednesday and then wanted to go.

So I decided, okay, I will take you golfing.

And we were in Nuego at a family cottage, so you can imagine, very fancy golf course, okay?

And so I wore my t-shirt, and uh I get to the first T and I hit a marginal shot, and uh my 13-year-old going into eighth grade has golfed once in his life, puts the ball down, and cranks it like 200 yards straight as an arrow.

And I look at him and he goes, What?

And I said, What was that?

And he says, That was golf.

So apparently I got a Tiger Woods on my hands.

Anyway, we are in the fourth week of a series called Hard Won Wisdom, uh, in which we're exploring the life of one of Israel's most famous citizens, a guy named David.

And to get us going with what I want to talk to you about today, I need to ask you a question.

The question goes like this Have you ever wondered why God seems to make us wait?

I think that's actually I know that's a question every one of us has asked at least a few times over the years.

And you know how it goes?

Um you pray and then you trust, and then nothing happens, right?

And then eventually, if enough time goes by, um you begin to wonder like, God, uh, I don't mean to be disrespectful, but are you paying attention?

Am I not praying the right words?

And and I because I have something I need you to do, and I don't understand why I'm waiting.

And I thought about this a lot in preparing for today, but I think we feel this way because most of us assume that waiting on God is simply about waiting for the thing that we're hoping for, right?

Like that God is preparing the job or the relationship or the answer to our question for us.

But what if God is doing something else during our seasons of waiting?

Like what if, while we're waiting for him to change our circumstances or to provide us with some needed information, he's actually using those circumstances and those questions to change us.

And I'm telling you, um, I've become convinced that God often does his deepest work in us before he ever does his greatest work through us.

And I know that's not how it feels in the moment.

In the moment it feels like God is late, or that he's forgotten about us, or that we have not maybe found the right red phone to talk to him.

But but here's the thing: looking back, if you're honest, looking back at your life, you often discover God wasn't absent in the seasons that he seemed absent.

He was using those seasons to prepare us for something that we couldn't see yet.

And I don't know anybody in the Bible who illustrates that reality better than David.

And in fact, as we continue in the story of his life, that's exactly where the story takes us today.

So as we enter the narrative, uh, just to set it up for you, if you're new with us, David has been waiting for something that God promised him for 15 years.

It was a promise that one day he would become Israel's king.

And even though David doesn't know it at the time of this story, his wait was almost over.

But here's the thing: the question for David wasn't, will I become king?

That had been decided.

He knew it would happen, he just didn't know when.

The question that was kind of lurking in the background of this narrative is what kind of king have the waiting years prepared David to be?

And so now, if you're uh just jumping in with us today, you need to know that David's journey to this moment hasn't exactly been a straight line.

Like when David was just a boy, God had promised him that he would be Israel's next king, and then almost overnight, his life changed.

He defeated Goliath, he became a national hero, he served in King Saul's court and even married Saul's daughter.

It really looked like God's promise to David was unfolding exactly the way he imagined it would.

But then King Saul became increasingly jealous of David and decided to kill him.

And so David spent the next 15 years on the run.

But as I mentioned, during those difficult years, God was teaching David a lesson he needed to learn before he was ready to wear a crown.

He didn't know that, but God did.

God knew that David needed to understand.

If God had promised him the throne, he didn't have to seize it.

He only had to trust, and that was not an easy lesson to learn.

In fact, if you're familiar with David's story, you may recall that there were two different occasions during those 15 years when David could have become king immediately by taking matters into his own hands.

And the first is one of my favorite stories in the Old Testament.

It happened inside a cave near a desert oasis called Engedi.

Engedi is down by the Dead Sea, so kind of uh south of where Jesus spent most of his time.

This is a picture uh from that area, and it's full of caves.

And so this is sort of the setting of the story.

Uh, David and his men were hiding in one of these caves.

If you go there, they'll tell you which one it was.

They don't know it's for the tourists, right?

Yeah.

But they're hiding in one of the caves as Saul and his army of 3,000 men walked by.

And the men David's men knew.

If they were discovered, it's like game over.

But then something completely unexpected and really amazing happens.

The author of the account of the story tells us that Saul, as in the king, went in to relieve himself.

And I dug into the Hebrew, I'll spare you, but it means what you think it means.

Yes.

Um, David and his men were far back in the same cave.

Like you can't make this up.

And so, as I imagine it, Saul's eyes have not yet adjusted to the darkness, but David's have.

And for the first time in years, David isn't the hunted.

For the first time, David is in control, and his men can hardly contain themselves.

They believe that David will one day be king.

And so I would imagine inside their minds and hearts, it's like they're looking at David going, dude, this is it.

This is the moment God promised you.

You don't have to run anymore.

We don't have to sleep in caves anymore.

God has delivered your enemy on a silver platter.

They said it this way, they told David, this is the day the Lord spoke of when he said to you, I will give your enemy into your hands for you to deal with as you wish.

And their argument makes sense, right?

I mean, this has got to be it.

See, but I would argue that sometimes the hardest part of following God is that the shortcut that presents itself looks exactly like the answer to our prayers.

Let me say that again.

Sometimes the hardest part about following God is that the shortcut that presents itself in our lives to take us from where we are to where we want to be looks exactly like the answer to our prayers, even when it's not.

Anyway, as the story continues to unfold, David quietly moves towards Saul with a sword in his hand.

And I like to imagine what was going on in his mind.

Again, years of sleeping in caves and wondering if like this was gonna be the day that Saul would find him, and years of watching like normal people live normal lives while he was just struggling to survive.

I mean, he'd lost his home, he'd lost his wife, he'd lost his position.

And now the man who's responsible for all of that took everything from him is standing only a few feet away doing his business, right?

Like if David strikes now, the waiting is over.

Everything he's hoped for and dreamed for and longed for could be his in a single moment.

One swing, and he's king.

And then David does something that no one expected.

The author describes it this way: He writes, David crept up unnoticed and cut off a corner of Saul's robe.

And I think the guys were like, What?

Now there's some interesting um cultural context to this.

Saul uh was uh part of obviously the kingdom of Israel, he was the king, and in ancient times, God had told his people to sew on the corners of their garments these strings to remind them that they were to follow God and his laws.

And so many scholars believe that David cut off those tassels, and that was what was going on in this situation.

Um, but either way, it's fascinating, and then look at what the author tells us next.

He says, afterward, like after cutting the tassels, David was conscious stricken, and that's weird.

Like he hadn't killed Saul, and he could have, he hadn't even threatened Saul, like back off or else, right?

He'd only cut off a piece of his robe.

So why wouldn't his conscience let him celebrate?

Why was his conscience bothering him?

And I think I think it's because David realized something that his men hadn't realized, and it goes like this there's a difference between having an opportunity and having God's permission.

Like David or David's men saw a solution, but David saw a test.

Like he believed if God wants me to be king, he doesn't need me to violate his will to get there.

And you're like, how do you know that's what David was thinking?

Well, he says it this way to his men.

He says, okay, he's explaining the Lord forbid that I should do such a thing as in kill Saul to my master, the Lord's anointed, or lay my hand on him, for he is the anointed of the Lord.

In other words, hey, God put Saul in his position.

I don't like him, and I don't really like that fact, but God put him there, and it's not my job to take him out, which tells us something.

Apparently, over the years in the wilderness, David had learned a truth that would shape the rest of his life.

He would say, if you want to live according to the way God wants you to live, things have to be done according to God's will, in God's way, and then this is the hard one, in God's time.

God's will, God's way, God's time.

But that's it, don't miss what's happening here.

I mean, David's men are being practical.

I think they thought what I would have thought.

They're looking at the situation and thinking, David, you are so overthinking this.

Like, this has to be from God.

I mean, there are hundreds of caves in this region, and he walks into hours to do his business.

The odds of that are like it's impossible.

This can't be a coincidence.

God has to be in this, there's no other explanation.

And I wonder if you've ever had a moment you felt like this in your life.

Let me explain.

You had prayed an honest prayer.

God, if this job is for from you, open the door.

God, if this relationship is from you, please help make it happen.

God, if if if this is your will, then give me an opportunity.

But the problem is, and some of us have learned this the hard way, an open door isn't always God's endorsement.

Sometimes it's actually a test.

And David understood that, and his men didn't.

David understood that not every opportunity is an assignment from God.

Sometimes it's like a trial to see whether we'll trust God's timing.

In the years leading up to this moment, the years on the run, David had learned if I have to disobey God in order to secure what God has promised to me, then I'm not trusting him, I'm trusting myself.

That's why David didn't murder Saul in that cave.

It wasn't because he lacked courage, but it was because he had confidence that God's will, God's way, and God's time would always be better than his own, even when it didn't feel like it in the moment.

Okay, so now if that had been the only test David faced on this front, it might be tempting to explain away his actions in the cave as like a fleeting moment of clarity and confidence in the Lord.

But see, a few years later, David gets another opportunity to take a shortcut to the throne.

And this time, Saul isn't in a cave, he's asleep in the middle of his camp, and he's surrounded by his soldiers.

And somehow David and one of his men sneak into the camp and they find Saul.

So once again, he's defenseless.

It's the same temptation in a different location, it's the same test.

And I can only imagine what David was feeling like standing there years later after the experience in the cave.

I mean, the man who had stolen years and now more years from his life is completely exposed.

David doesn't even have to fight, it's all right there.

And then the man who came with David into the camp whispers to him, hey, today God has delivered your enemy into your hands.

Like, I thought it was in the cave.

Okay, that wasn't the right time.

Here we go.

Now let me pin him to the ground with one thrust of the spear.

You don't even have to do it.

I'll do it.

I won't strike him twice.

It's almost the same argument David's men had made in the cave.

Like, dude, God has given you this opportunity.

Take it.

But what's so interesting is like David doesn't even appear to wrestle with the decision.

He immediately says no again.

Not because the temptation is smaller.

I think it would have been larger after the more years on the run, but because David has been marked by his time in the wilderness.

Years of walking with God, years of relying on God for his daily bread, years of trusting God's promise, years of refusing to take shortcuts.

It changed the way David saw the world, and it changed the way David saw this moment.

So the question for him was no longer, can I become king?

Obviously, I can.

The question had become: would becoming king this way honor God?

Because in this moment, that was David's priority.

So the wilderness, it hadn't just changed David's perspective.

You start to see it had actually forged something in his character.

God wasn't merely teaching David how to wait, he was using the waiting to shape the man David would become.

And I would argue there's a sense in which that's true for all of us.

I mean, we tend to spend much of our lives asking God, when will this season end?

I know I do, right?

But maybe, maybe there's a better question.

Maybe the better question when we find ourselves in that waiting space in those waiting years is God, what are you trying to produce in me before this season ends?

What is it that you want to adjust in my character before I exit this waiting season and enter whatever's on the other side?

So that's what this second encounter reveals.

Years have passed.

Saul is still trying to kill David, and when the same temptation comes back, David makes the same choice.

Because I would argue obedience has become more than a decision to David.

It's a part of who he is.

The wilderness taught him to trust God.

And that's why when his companion says, Hey, I will take Saul out, I don't even need a second swing, David responds instantly, don't destroy him.

He says, Who can lay a hand on the Lord's anointed and be guiltless?

In other words, this is not the way.

Like David understood something in the moment that his companion didn't.

And it's something that, I mean, I've had friends say to me for years, uh, it goes like this, just because you can doesn't mean you should.

Hoov has said this to their teenagers.

Right?

Yeah, there's a difference between opportunity and wisdom.

And David is like, listen, if I'm gonna trust God, you taking Saul out is not wise.

It's not right, and it's not gonna take my life or your life in the direction you want.

Just because you can't doesn't mean you should.

So David twice had the opportunity to seize what God had promised him, and twice he walked away.

Because again, he had come to believe that things had to be done according to God's will, God's way, and God's time.

David was convinced that if he became king by shedding Saul's blood, he might gain a throne, but he would lose the his integrity and his ability to lead with a clear conscience, and he saw how valuable that was.

You know, um, if you think about it, it's shocking how often in life we're tempted to accomplish the right thing the wrong way.

Here's what I mean.

We want financial security, and so we're tempted to compromise our integrity to get it.

Or we want uh the relationship, so we're tempted to ignore God's boundaries and our behavior to get it, or we want the promotion, so we're tempted to sacrifice our character in order to get it.

We convince ourselves that if the destination is good, then the shortcut must be good too.

But see, David understood something that we desperately need to remember.

God is just as concerned about the means as he is about the end.

The means to an end.

God is just as concerned about the means as he is about the end.

The way we do things matters to God.

God's will, pursued God's way in God's time, never requires us to disobey him.

Never.

Anyway, as the story continues, we learn that eventually Saul dies in battle, and he does not die by David's sword.

And after years of waiting, David is finally crowned king.

Can you imagine what that must have been like for him?

I mean, I think he had dreamed about it for years.

God had promised him a kingdom when he was a boy, but between that promise and the palace were years of fear and disappointment and disillusionment and waiting.

But now, at last, he had the crown.

Did he think back to the day that the prophet Samuel poured oil on his head while he was just a boy?

Did he remember that day standing in front of Goliath in the valley of Elah with nothing but a sling and five smooth stones?

Did he remember the nights in the cave wondering whether God's promise had somehow slipped away because you know there were nights when he doubted?

Did he recall the loneliness and the fear and the disappointment and the friends that he had buried and the prayers that seemed to bounce off the ceiling of the cave?

I don't know what he remembered.

The Bible doesn't tell us, but I do know that when that crown finally rested on David's head, it represented far more than a new position.

It signified years of him learning that God keeps his promises even when his timing is different from ours.

David did not arrive at the throne wondering whether God could be trusted.

He knew that God could be trusted.

And that profoundly shaped David.

In fact, as the story continues, the author of the account of David's life doesn't describe Him as a man intoxicated by power.

And you're like, boy, all those years on the run, I would think he would seize power and seize control.

That's not the story.

In fact, check out one of the first things David does as king, and I love this.

He asks, is there anyone still left of the house of Saul to whom I can show kindness?

Like, what?

I mean, David, Saul had wanted you dead.

And now you're looking for someone in his family to bless?

So you see, like the wilderness hadn't simply delayed David's reign, it had changed him on the inside.

The waiting had produced exactly the kind of king that God intended for his people.

So for 15 years, God wasn't just preparing David for a throne.

He was preparing David for the responsibility that comes with a throne.

I don't know if you noticed, but anyone can be given authority, but not everybody does well with it.

That's why I think the greatest test in David's life wasn't whether he could survive in the wilderness, it was whether the wilderness would produce in David the kind of king that Israel desperately needed.

I was thinking about this week.

I don't think power changes people.

I don't think getting power and authority changes people.

I actually think it reveals who they are.

I think it reveals what's already been formed in their hearts.

And I think there's a sense that that's true for all of us.

I mean, you and I don't have crowns, at least if you do, we can talk afterwards.

I'd love to know how that happened, right?

We don't so we don't have crowns, but we do have influence.

We have people who are watching us.

Children and grandchildren and employees and co-workers and friends and neighbors.

They watch us.

So we have implied influence.

So I guess the question isn't again whether we'll have influence.

The question is, what kind of people will people encounter when they watch us acting in our influence?

It's a great question for us to ask.

And uh and for David, like you think, well, what kind of king did the years of waiting produce?

I would argue a king who trusted God and who learned to surrender power instead of grasping for it.

A good king.

And that's how he's remembered, by and large.

A good king, but not a perfect king.

So some of you save your emails, I know, right?

Um, David eventually would misuse his authority and make some absolutely devastating choices.

And we're actually going to talk about that next week.

I told you we weren't gonna talk about Bathsheba.

I thought, what the heck, we're just gonna roll the dice and do it.

So be sure to come back.

Interesting stuff, right?

But I think I think the fact that David failed was actually in part to point us to someone greater.

Because as many of you know, hundreds of years later, another king would come in Israel, and he wasn't born in a cave, he wasn't born in a palace surrounded by soldiers.

He was born in a manger in a cave.

And after he grew up, he introduced the world to a very different sort of kingdom.

I mean, listen to how Jesus' disciple John describes the night before the cross in his account of Jesus' life.

He writes, as Jesus approached that moment, he says, Jesus knew that the Father had put all things under his power, and that he had come from God and was returning to God.

All things under his power, every ounce of authority, every right and privilege.

He said, John says, this was already his.

And you're like, in that moment, John, what did Jesus do with all of that authority and right and privilege and power?

John says, look at this.

So, this is like the next words.

So he got up from the meal he was having with his disciples and took off his outer clothing and wrapped a towel around his waist, and after that he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples' feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped around him.

John could just have said, Jesus washed feet.

But first he tells us what Jesus knew.

He says, Jesus knew where he had come from and where he was going, and he knew that the Father had placed all things under his authority.

In other words, Jesus did not serve his disciples by washing their feet because he was insecure and was trying to earn something from them.

He served them because he was completely secure.

I mean, most of us tend to use power to somehow prove ourselves.

Jesus used power the way he did because he had nothing to prove.

And he wanted to communicate that in the most powerful way.

His identity wasn't hanging on what people thought of him, it rested completely in what his father had already said about him.

And secure people are free to kneel.

So Jesus didn't use his authority to demand service.

He certainly could have.

He used it to become a servant.

Here's something else.

Don't miss whose feet Jesus was washing.

I mean, in just a few hours, his disciple Peter would deny even knowing Jesus three times.

And then Judas was there.

Judas had already betrayed him, and still Jesus knelt and he washed the feet of the man who would betray him because Jesus wasn't serving people who deserved it.

He was revealing the heart of God.

That's what perfect authority looks like.

That's what perfect love looks like.

In that moment, Jesus completely redefined power.

Like the world says, if you have authority, make sure people know it, make sure people respect it, make sure people understand it.

But Jesus says, hey, if you've been given authority, use it to lift someone else up.

The world says, climb higher, and Jesus says kneel lower.

The world says, make people serve you, and Jesus says, hey, find someone to serve.

That's the kind of king Jesus is, and that's the kind of people that he's forming.

So God's goal was never simply to get David onto a throne.

It was to shape David into the kind of man who could be trusted with the throne.

And maybe that's not entirely unlike what God is doing in your life and in my life right now.

I mean, kind of back to where we started.

Maybe the waiting isn't punishment.

Maybe the waiting is preparation.

Like maybe God isn't keeping something from you.

Maybe he's doing something in you.

Because even though it might not feel like it right now, one day the waiting will be over.

And one day God will entrust you with influence, an opportunity, or a responsibility, or a relationship, or a platform you prayed for.

Like, and when that day comes, the question won't simply be, what have you been given?

It's who have you become?

How have the waiting years shaped you?

Because like the opportunity itself won't make you into someone new, it will reveal the person you've been becoming all along.

Success doesn't make us humble, it reveals whether we've learned humility.

And influence doesn't suddenly make us generous, it reveals whether generosity has already taken root in our hearts.

And leadership doesn't suddenly teach us to trust God.

It reveals whether we've been trusting Him long before anyone was watching.

That's why the waiting matters.

That's why the waiting years matter, because the person you become during the waiting is the person you'll be when the waiting is over.

And I love what Jesus said a few minutes after he washed the disciples' feet.

He looked at them and he says, I have set an example that you should do as I have done for you.

In other words, um, guys, this isn't just the way I lead.

It's the way I want you to lead.

I'm about to exit the earth, I'm about to hand you the keys to the church, and we're about to take this thing global, and you need to understand you're gonna have a lot of authority, but you need to lead as I led, because in God's kingdom, greatness has never been measured by how many people serve you, it's measured by how willing you are to serve them.

So David spent years waiting for a crown.

Jesus wore a crown of thorns.

David refused to seize power because he trusted his father with his future, and Jesus surrendered his life because he trusted his father completely.

And because of that, God exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name.

We spend so much of our life asking God when?

Like, when will you answer?

When will you open the door?

When will you change my circumstances?

And those aren't bad questions.

They're honest questions, they're real questions.

We should ask those questions, but I think David's story invites us to ask an even better question.

It goes like this God, what or who are you shaping me to become while I wait?

And I would argue for David, that question is the culmination of some hard one wisdom.

And we will pick it up there next week.

Uh but for now, if you're here in the room, I'd love to invite you to stand.

I'll close our time in prayer.

And umce again this week, if you're new around here every week, um we invite you, if you'd like some prayer before you leave, just to meet some friends under the screen to the left.

They'd love to spend some time with you.

Um, but for the rest of us, let me close our time in prayer.

Wow, Heavenly Father, we thank you for the honesty and the example of David.

We thank you for his courage to trust you in seasons of waiting, long seasons of waiting.

And I pray for any of us in this community who are experiencing that right now, where maybe it's been years and we've been praying the same things and we're waiting for you to move.

I pray that you would maybe shift our focus just a little bit into what you might be doing inside of us.

Because we do we desire to be a people who fully trust you with the outcomes.

And we pray that as we do, we would reflect the heart and the character of your son, our Savior Jesus Christ.

It is in his name, the name above all names, that we pray.

And everyone said, Amen.

It's been great to be with you, friends.

We'll see you next week.