There’s a song we sing often in church and comes up a lot on the iPod in the car that goes, “Strength will rise as we wait upon the Lord.”

When it comes on my husband, Scott, always jokes to the boys, “There’s mommy’s favorite song!”

The truth is I’ve never found much strength in waiting on the Lord, or anything else or anyone else, for that matter.

I’m not a “waiting” kinda girl. I’m a go-go-go kinda girl.

Let’s go. Let’s do it. Let’s get it done. Whatcha waiting for?

If you’ve spent any time at all in relationship with God you’ve probably noticed that’s not His nature.

God tends to take His time.

For people like me, waiting on God’s timing is counterintuitive. It’s uncomfortable. It feels painfully slow. And in weak moments, it causes doubt.

We rented our current home for two years before we bought it, and the waiting for things to line up to make the purchase gave me fits.

There were tears, sleepless nights, and more moments of doubt than I care to admit to. And you know what? During that time of wait the price of our home dropped by $60,000. God knew what He was doing, and thank goodness He went on His timeline and not mine.

Impulsivity and impatience can be expensive.

But in moments of waiting, do you ever wonder, “God could fix this NOW. Why doesn’t He?” I do.

The truth is, the wait is never about God. God doesn’t need more time. It takes no effort for Him to “fix” things, to “perfect that which concerns us,” as Psalms 138:8 puts it.

The wait is always about us.

We need more time to learn about God’s nature. To learn more about the parts of our personalities that needs some growth. (Like patience, ahem.)

To see how God’s way is always, always better than our way, so that we can, in turn, learn to lay down our own will and seek His instead.

It’s not always a comfortable process, but it is always beneficial.

In one of the classes I teach, last night I took the students through an exercise. Instead of sharing prayer requests, I said, “Let’s thank God in advance for the solutions that He’s already prepared for us. Let’s thank Him now for the things we are still seeking and praying for.”

A few students joined me in giving “advance praise,” but in truth, a lot of people looked at me like I had lost some marbles.

But I received a huge blessing today in response to my prayer and my praise. And I wonder if those who stayed silent last night can say the same thing?

I know my walk with God, just like my leadership, can be graceless and goofy at times. Because the truth is, Amie Streater can be graceless. And goofy. And impatient.

I can have a really, really hard time with the wait. But God is showing me how to not just wait but also to watch, to keep my eyes on Him and watch Him do something even better than what I was praying for.

And every time God proves Himself faithful, I, in turn, get a little bit stronger. And someday soon I will sing, “Strength will rise as we wait upon the Lord!” and actually mean it.