Ugh, why are so many people here? I tried to shake off irritation and sleepiness as I signed in for my monthly appointment at the fertility clinic. I glanced at the clock as I took a seat in the waiting room. 7:55.
Lordy, it was early, especially after getting into town late last night after a 17-hour drive home from Georgia.
The room was more crowded than usual, which only fueled my dark mood. Two ladies were loudly catching up on their lives since junior high. I need at least two hours of quiet in the morning before holding conversations longer than two sentences. Again, I tried to focus on catching up on my Twitter feed, but was soon distracted by a scene at the coffee machine. Surely this wasn’t happening.
A first-time Keurig user.
The poor guy just wanted some coffee, but I was ready to tear my hair out by the time he was adding creamer and sugar.
He first couldn’t figure out if he need to open the K-cup. No, the answer is no. And then he couldn’t understand how to open the machine. Then he didn’t know if he needed to take out the basket. Again, the answer is no. He also might have struggled to turn on the machine. Each step I was almost ready to dart over there and slam the cup in the basket and start the machine, but he managed to figure it out.
Poor coffee guy was just a blip on the spectrum of eternity, but it just added to my annoyance of being THERE for THAT reason. Again.
A Spiritual Waiting Room
Waiting rooms are not a fun place to be, are they? Sometimes other people are annoying and you can’t escape. Your time is not your own, and sometimes, un-fun procedures await you. Waiting seasons are very similar. Your time is not your own. Annoyances rub into wounds like salts. And you know the refining process, the waiting process may not be very “fun.”
I don’t know what you’re waiting on: a spouse, a job, a home, a healing, or maybe a baby like I am. God hasn’t forgotten you and he never will. But his ways can’t always be explained. Sometimes, God uses spiritual waiting rooms to prepare us for things to come. For the same inexplicably reason that Kurtis and I are having to wait to be parents, he chose to bring us together in marriage miraculously and rapidly. Within nine months of meeting each other for the first time, we were engaged. It’s not every day something moves as fast as that. I can’t explain why he chose to do that. I also can’t explain why we still aren’t parents yet.
Waiting Rooms Aren’t Homes
It’s hard to fight the feeling that God has slammed on the brakes on a road that you could see your way clearly down. You turn to him and want to question, then yell, “What is wrong?!” It’s hard to fight the feeling of loss and confusion as you sit there in the waiting room (literally and figuratively) as one by one, all the other patients get called in for their time with the Doctor, but you’re left sitting there.
But even if it doesn’t feel like it, waiting rooms are not our homes. We don’t stay there. We are only there for a little bit. (OK, sometimes we’re in there for a LONG time, but you get my point) So don’t give up hope. Keep your eyes on the one who sees the whole painting, the whole tapestry, the whole puzzle for what it really is. A beautiful masterpiece where no one is forgotten, no pain is wasted, no hope is foolish.
