When we wait for God,
The wait is not in vain

ECPA 2020
Selected as 'Best Book of the Year'
The latest work from the author of "Dark Clouds, Deeper Compassion"

“We consider the time we wait as wasted time, as empty time.
For a Christian, time spent waiting on God is never wasted.”
Recommended by Pastor Kim Byeong-sam (Manna Church)!

Walking in faith, waiting on God in uncertain situations.
This is a truly difficult task.
This book teaches us how to wait on God during this empty time in our lives without wasting our time waiting.


“Will you wait on God, or will you replace it with anxiety?”
The blank spaces in our lives leave us feeling angry, anxious, and frustrated.
Are we going to fill this waiting time with anxiety and anger?
Let us make the gaps in our lives a time to wait for God.
Let us consider this waiting as a time given by God to change our spiritual direction.
If so, this waiting will never be a waste or a waste of time in life.
The author assures us that waiting for God will never be in vain.
Let us not spend this blank time in our lives doing nothing, but rather using it as a time to seek God.
In this book, the author guides us through six methods.
As waiters, let us follow the theology of waiting that the author teaches.

This book is about 'the gaps in life'.
And it's a book that explores how the Bible commands us to fill that void of uncertainty with waiting on God.
This is not a new concept.
Waiting on God is an ancient concept found throughout the Bible.
But it's easy to ignore this.
It's easy to dismiss waiting on God as 'old-fashioned.'
It's easy to dismiss it as just another spiritual topic from an older era when Christians were too serious.
Furthermore, most people do not like to wait.
So we see the gaps in life as something we just have to endure.
Add to that stress, pain, and a long period of time, and you can imagine what it would feel like.
Rather than experiencing peace as we navigate uncertainty through worship, we tend to fill the void in our lives with fear, anxiety, frustration, and anger.
Many people see waiting time as wasted time.
I've been there too.
No, it's still like that now.
This is why I wrote this book.

Everyone experiences waiting.
So what's important is the 'way' of waiting.
Each chapter deals with one of the ways of waiting.
So, how should we wait for God?
* Silently: Waiting is hard
* Often: Waiting is common
* Holding on to the Word: Waiting is Biblical
* With patience: waiting is slow
* Actively: Waiting is a command
* Together: Waiting is relational

Waiting is not simply a part of human life, but is central to Christianity.
This is why both the Old and New Testaments talk so often about waiting.
As with many things, including suffering and the cross, God seeks to transform what is painful and confusing.
This is also one of the reasons why the Bible commands Christians to wait.
From God's perspective, waiting is a good thing.
But that doesn't mean waiting is easy.
Life is full of blanks.
There are many moments or periods when you have to wait.
But if we are not careful and prudent, we can end up filling those gaps with spiritually useless responses.
In the pages that follow, you will discover how to fill the gaps in your life with truths about God.
You will learn to wait on God.
Furthermore, you will learn to shake off typical temptations and navigate uncertain times through worship.
I hope we don't see waiting as just a delay.
Let us discover together through this journey the unexpected comfort and peace that come when we wait on God.
Waiting is not a waste of time.
Let's learn together why this is so and how we can avoid wasting our wait.

Even non-Christians would do well to cultivate patience, for Christianity itself is a religion of patience.
God's children, then and now, are commanded to wait.
We wait for the full coming of the kingdom of God.
But our waiting is distinctly different from that of unbelievers.
Those who place their hope on the rock of Christ's finished work do not grit their teeth and wait in vain.
The cry of Maranatha recorded in Revelation 22:20 is meant to implore Jesus to come quickly, expressing the feeling of "I can't wait any longer!" However, when citizens of the kingdom of heaven find it difficult to wait, heaven helps.
Patience is the fourth virtue in the list of fruits of the Spirit.
If you are a person who is becoming holy, you should show signs of growing patience in your life.
That's why this book you're holding in your hands right now is important.
Mark Brogap wants to help you wait like a Christian.
He wants to sit next to you as you wait and show you how to persevere with the time-tested principles of Scripture.
Above all, he wants to show that 'waiting itself is a help.'
There's a lot to be learned from the slow-moving plot, the thick fog of discord, and the longer-than-expected, more difficult-to-endure situations.
Brogap's voice is that of a friend and fellow traveler urging us to wait patiently.

A fruit born from waiting
John Milton, the famous 17th-century English poet and politician, lost his sight at the age of 42.
A man of deep faith and action, he wrestled with permanent damage and the new limitations it brought.
Not long after losing his sight, he wrote Sonnet 19, reflecting on his physical inability to serve God as he had before due to the yoke of darkness.
In that poem he says:
“Those who best bear the light yoke serve Him best.” He wrote those breathtakingly beautiful final lines as he realized that his blindness might have a purpose.
“Even those who stand and wait serve Him.” Ten years later, he published Paradise Lost, his greatest work born in the darkness of waiting.
Waiting doesn't mean you can't serve God.
It just serves in a different way.
I hope you, like me, will find in this book the strength and wisdom to endure the waiting you must endure.
Whether the wait is big or small, I hope that God will be glorified through you as you persevere and steadily bear fruit in that wait.

--- From "Recommendations"