Don’t Waste Your Waiting

Photo by Andrik Langfield on Unsplash

Could you have predicted what the last five years of your life would contain? I can tell you that there is at least one year none of us saw coming. The number of jokes about 20/20 vision, seeing clearly the way forward in a new decade were made viciously ironic in arguably one of the most confusing years of our generation. Even here locally, we could never have guessed exactly who we would lose and when, leaving us astonished year after year.

But we also couldn’t have predicted the joys of the last five years either. Who would have guessed the number of children that now sit in our midst! Many of them didn’t even exist five years ago! We’ve added many new families, grown our school, and seen our denomination grow and stay faithful to God.

As much as things have indeed changed in the last five years, most day to day operations felt like, well, day to day operations. It seemed like many weeks or months would go by where we just waited. That great theologian Dr. Seuss once weighed in on waiting in his book, Oh, the Places You’ll Go. In the midst of a lifetime of travels, the great doctor said, you will find one place that will fill you with dread, the waiting place. It is a place where everyone is just waiting, waiting for a phone call or a train to come in, and he calls this “a most useless place.” Instead, he says, you should be going where the boom bands are playing, where things are happening.

Now, the venerable doctor is onto something, but his emphasis isn’t quite right. Though waiting is often seen as a blight, and stirs our minds to see it not right, it isn’t the wait that is useless, you see, it is often the means God forms you to be. Things aren’t only happening with the boom bands. Things are always happening, even in the waiting place, because our God is always at work, not in fits and starts, but never slumbering or sleeping.

We will see our two points today God is working even when you don’t see it and God’s return motivates our faithful working.

God is working even when you don’t see it

Our chapter opens picking up where we left off in Joseph’s life, yet another pit. He has been there long enough to gain the trust of the prison warden and put in charge of most everything. But being in charge of prison is still to be in prison. This isn’t a fun place, as Ross points out, the evidence of this comes in Psalm 105:17–18 “he had sent a man ahead of them, Joseph, who was sold as a slave. His feet were hurt with fetters; his neck was put in a collar of iron;” and his own pleas to be released in verse 14 (632-33). He has been here for “some time,” and we really have no way of knowing exactly how long. We must remember that the only reason he is here is because he did the right thing. As one commentator mentions, “Joseph’s greatest setback arose out of his greatest moral victory” (Matthews).

In the midst of this, two more prisoners are added, a cup bearer and a baker. Joseph is assigned to serve them, and once again we are told that they all continued for “some time.” Again, no way to know exactly how long. This is something that I am sure happened many times in Joseph’s life. Prisoners go in, they go out, nothing really separating one day from another. This is a waiting place if ever there was one.

Joseph shows us the model of not wasting your wait. Now, Joseph has no idea how this story is supposed to work out. We know that this cupbearer is going to be the key, but Joseph doesn’t know that. Even if he could somehow guess that maybe this cupbearer could potentially help him, it is “some time” before Joseph has any sort of opening. He can’t see God moving, but we can. We laugh at all the Israelites scared of Goliath, because we know that he is going to become a proverb. We can see God setting up the board for the lives of the Biblical characters, but we have to learn that He doesn’t change.

One day, God moves visibly for Joseph. The servants have dreams that they are disturbed by and want the interpretation of. Dreams were often considered messages from the gods, and countries like Egypt had a class of people who specialized in dream interpretation. Joseph steps up and says that, actually, only God has the key to dreams, and he can help them (Matthews).

Now, imagine if Joseph gives up here. As Ross points out, how have Joseph’s other interpretations of dreams gone (633)? How accurate are his dreams? It would be easy for Joseph to throw up his hands and say, “God must want to use someone else to interpret dreams, because look at how my dreams of rulership turned out. Cupbearer Guy, maybe you really do need a magician, because God sure doesn’t seem to reveal things.” Imagine being a time traveler at that point in the story. You aren’t allowed to tell the him how things are going to turn out, and you hear Joseph in a low moment say those things to the cupbearer. You would be beside yourself. “Don’t stop trusting God, now! Do you have any idea what is about to happen?” He would turn to you, probably wondering why you’re shouting at him in English and say, “it has been eleven years since I was stolen from my family. Exactly how much longer do you want me to keep trying for this?”

Have you been there? Been there in parenting? Been there in being honest at your job when no one else is? Been there in a hard marriage? You know what you’re supposed to do, but it doesn’t seem to be actually getting you anywhere. You see other people not following God and getting better results. You begin to ask, “Has God really said?” Joseph doesn’t do that. He keeps his faith in God’s promises to him and keeps doing what is right.

Joseph just keeps going, being faithful to God, fighting back discouragement and hears their dreams. For us who are familiar with the story, the interpretation seems obvious, but that is only because we know what the interpretation is. It is like re-reading a mystery novel. The first read through was, well, a mystery! But once you know the ending, you say to yourself, “It was obvious the whole time! The dog never barked!” No, it wasn’t obvious, and it isn’t here either. The details here of the three grapes and three baskets: how did Joseph know it was three days for the both of them? Even if he knew Pharaoh’s birthday was coming up in three days, it still could be three years from now on Pharaoh’s birthday. Or it could be three days for cupbearer, three months for the baker, and vice versa. This story is meant to tell us that God is the one who interprets these dreams. Only two figures in Biblical history interpret dreams, Daniel and Joseph, but they both make clear that it is God who reveals their meanings (Matthews). They are trusting Him, not their personal talents. Joseph passes along from God that the cupbearer is going to be restored (lifted his head) and the baker is going to be executed (lifted his head from him!).

Now, Joseph asks the cupbearer to put in the good word for him. A cupbearer was a good guy to know. They were the ones who were trusted to keep the king from getting poisoned. They would sip his wine and taste his food for him to make sure it isn’t going to kill him. As such a person of trust, he often had the ear of the king (ISBE, 837). It makes sense that Joseph would attempt to secure his own release.

The three days pass, and exactly what Joseph said happened. The cupbearer was restored and the baker was hanged. Clearly, what God says, goes, and that will be critical to remember for the next chapter.

But there is one heartbreaking outcome, the cupbearer forgot all about Joseph. We will see in the next chapter that this forgetfulness lasts for two full years. What a disappointment for Joseph! How close to freedom that must have felt. He got the ear of the chief cupbearer, the most trusted officer in the land, and it has only been three days since he spoke to him! He is with Pharaoh now! I’ll bet Joseph was packing his bags! But alas, the waiting place endures for two more years. The cupbearer may have forgotten, but God hasn’t. At the right moment, He will call Joseph, but not before.

You can’t rush God, though many people try. In Jesus’ ministry, we remember when Lazarus got sick. News reached him that Lazarus was sick, but Jesus stayed put until Lazarus died (John 11:6 “So, when he heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was.”). The sisters told Him that if He had only been there, Lazarus wouldn’t have died. He got there “too late.” Of course, we know exactly how that story went, don’t we? We find out that He waited in order to raise Lazarus from the dead, the greatest miracle yet! Jesus was working even as He was waiting. The waiting place sure looked useless to Mary and Martha, but on the other side of Jesus’ work, it becomes obvious that Jesus was worth the wait.

God’s return motivates our faithful working.

So how do we wait like Joseph does? After all, we don’t have a dream like he did, laying out specifically what his life is supposed to be. It’s true, we have something better.

Look with me at James 5:7–11 “Be patient, therefore, brothers, until the coming of the Lord. See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, being patient about it, until it receives the early and the late rains. You also, be patient. Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand. Do not grumble against one another, brothers, so that you may not be judged; behold, the Judge is standing at the door. As an example of suffering and patience, brothers, take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord. Behold, we consider those blessed who remained steadfast. You have heard of the steadfastness of Job, and you have seen the purpose of the Lord, how the Lord is compassionate and merciful.” This is in a context where James has just told us not to presume we know what tomorrow will bring (James 4:13-15) and not to trust in riches that we have laid up (James 5:1-6).

He tells us to wait like two kinds of people. The first is waiting like a farmer. He’s planted his crops and is trusting that God will provide the rain. He isn’t pacing the fields yelling at clouds. He is being patient about it. He gives another example of the prophets in verses 10 and 11. How did things go for them? Typically, not well (Hebrews 11:35-38). But they were considered blessed because they remained steadfast even under trial. Both the farmer and the prophet know that God provides in His timing, so they work faithfully and leave the results to God as they wait. They wait with expectation.

The peace to be able to do this comes from the expectation that God is really going to work all things out. If you are waiting for circumstances to all line up, the house clean, the lawn finally set, enough money in the bank, surrounded by friends, and the laundry done you’ll never wait with patience. Look to the future, as Joseph did, to the destiny that is yet to come.

The God that these kinds of people are trusting in is a compassionate and merciful God who is at the door. I know, it has been a long time and Jesus hasn’t come back yet. But aren’t you glad He waited until you were born? I am. I know that was hard for the many generations before me, but I’m glad He waited for me. So I’ll gladly wait for Him. The promise that I will live forever in total joy and happiness for all eternity is an even better promise than saying my family will bow to me one day. It’s a bigger promise. So what if the wait is a little longer? It could be that the cupbearer has come into our jail. It could be just a little bit longer. So how do I want God to find me when I am called up? Grumbling in the corner about how life hasn’t gone quite the way I wanted it to? Or do I want Him to find me doing what He told me to do? And I can look at Him and say, “I was expecting you.”

Kids, you know how you’re always wanting to be older, because when you’re older and taller you can do more things? It can feel like your life is just filled with not being able to drive or play with cooler toys. But right now God is teaching you the most important thing in the world: He is teaching you to how to wait on Him. The kid who learns how to wait well has the most fun. God wants you to have a good life. But in order to have that good life, you have to learn how to wait for God to give it to you. That doesn’t mean you just sit around all day! Waiting on God isn’t staring at a wall. Waiting on God means doing what He says. Stay busy being obedient to your parents and kind to your siblings. Trust me, if you spend your time serving God and not thinking about yourself, it won’t feel like waiting at all.

Parents, have we not experienced that? When you dedicate your life to serving that little human God gave you we all say at the end, “The years went by so fast.” Dedicate your life to serving God, and the years will pass. Even if at times they seem to crawl by, hour by hour, those lengthy times are given as a gift to you to serve the One who died for you. Is that not the point of your life? Remember that “why.” You’re here to glorify God and enjoy Him forever. Of course you don’t see how it all is going to play out, but you know Who is playing it out. Eternity is coming. Of what a few more years? He has promised 2 Corinthians 4:17–18 “For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.”

The earth shall soon dissolve like snow, the sun forbear to shine; but God, who called me here below, will be forever mine.