God's Time vs Signs

We often talk about waiting for God. The first Bible verse that really hit me as a young Christian was, "Be still and know that I am God." (Psalm 46:10) And there are a lot of other passages of God telling his people to wait. Wait for the Lord. Be still before Him. And in church, we speak of that. Be patient, we tell each other. Wait for the Lord. But for most of us, we get impatient. A lot of single people are guilty of this. And one of the ways we try to force God to answer us is when we ask for a sign.

Now, I'm not saying the Lord does not give signs. He does. And we can certainly ask for them. But have we ever considered that maybe God doesn't want to give us a sign sometimes? And that the "sign" that we see is actually our own selves speeding up the progression of things by claiming a thing as a sign to justify the move that we are about to make? Can we truly say that we are waiting for the Lord?

"Lord, there were five coincidences involved with me meeting this man. That was a sign!" That was me, if you're wondering. But it didn't turn out the way I planned. That wasn't His plan. The man was part of His plan, but not what I planned for him. "Lord, the next girl that I have coffee with, that's the girl na ha! I claim it!" But what if He has other plans? Will you force the relationship, thinking, "this is my sign! I claimed it!" Like as if God has to follow us just because we claimed it. Now, sometimes, the person we eye is really God's chosen for us. But sometimes, He has other plans. And maybe, just maybe, the girl you have coffee with next is really just a girl you have coffee with.

What I'm trying to say is, when God tells you to wait, just wait. And when you ask for a sign, evaluate your motives. Because maybe you're trying to hurry God along, and are seeing "signs" He never intended as signs for something He doesn't intend to reveal yet. After all, our God loves surprises.