There’s a massive difference between sitting on a stalled bus in a thunderstorm and learning to drive before you get your license. Both involve waiting, but only one is actually preparing you for what comes next.
Most believers treat waiting on God like that bus scenario—stuck in place, watching the clock, getting increasingly restless while nothing seems to happen. They’re going through the motions of church attendance and occasional prayer, but there’s no real expectation that God will actually show up. It’s passive. It’s frustrated. And honestly, it’s exhausting.
But Scripture paints a completely different picture of what it means to wait on the Lord. When Jesus talks about servants waiting for their master’s return in Luke 12, He’s not describing people killing time. He’s describing people who are dressed and ready, lamps lit, spiritually alert, and positioned to immediately open the door when opportunity knocks. That’s active waiting. That’s expectant waiting. And it changes everything about how we experience God in our daily lives.
What Spiritual Readiness Actually Looks Like
Here’s what nobody tells you about waiting on God: it requires you to be in better spiritual shape than almost any other season of life. Think about it—when you know company is coming over, you clean the house. You prepare food. You set the table. You don’t just sit on the couch and hope things work out.
The same principle applies to our spiritual lives. Being “dressed in readiness” with our “lamps lit” isn’t about religious performance. It’s about consistent, daily habits that keep us spiritually sharp. That means actually reading Scripture, not just downloading sermon podcasts you never listen to. It means prayer that goes beyond crisis management. It means staying in communion with the Lord even when everything feels routine.
Hurricanes always teach thousands of Houston families this lesson the hard way. When people wait until the last minute to prepare, stores become empty. The highways became parking lots. Families who thought they had time suddenly realize they are completely unprepared for what was coming. The ones who fared best were those who had already established patterns of preparedness long before the storm appeared on the radar.
Spiritual preparedness works the same way. You can’t suddenly decide to get serious with God when crisis hits and expect to have the discernment, peace, and confidence that comes from years of walking closely with Him. The lamps need to be filled with oil before the darkness comes. Your spiritual resources need to be stocked before you desperately need them.
This kind of readiness also affects how clearly you see what’s happening around you. When your lamp is lit, you have discernment. You can navigate the chaos of current events without falling into either panic or denial. The world might feel increasingly unstable, but believers who are spiritually prepared can look at the same situations and recognize the seasons, understand what’s temporary and what’s eternal, and respond with wisdom instead of reaction.
The Power of Expectation Over Wishful Thinking
The Greek word used for “waiting” in Luke 12:36 carries the meaning of expectation—actively anticipating something you know is coming. It’s not hoping. It’s not wishing. It’s confident anticipation based on a promise that’s already been made.
Too many Christians pray without actually expecting God to answer. They go through religious motions without genuinely anticipating that God will move powerfully in their situation. They’re like people who set the table for guests but don’t actually believe anyone will show up. At some point, going through those motions without real expectation becomes exhausting and hollow.
But when you truly expect God to fulfill His promises, it changes how you prepare. A teenager learning to drive doesn’t just sit around dreaming about getting their license—they’re actively behind the wheel, practicing, learning, making mistakes, and getting better. They expect the day to come when they’ll drive independently, and that expectation fuels their preparation. Every time they practice parallel parking or navigate a busy intersection, they’re getting ready for what they know is coming.
That’s the kind of waiting God calls His people to. The Israelites in Babylon could have spent seventy years in despair, but the ones who waited expectantly got to see God orchestrate their return in miraculous ways. Cyrus the Great, a pagan king, ended up funding the rebuilding of the temple. That’s not something you could predict or manipulate—it’s something you trust God to deliver.
This expectation also shows up in how you respond when God starts to move. When the master knocks, the prepared servant doesn’t scramble around trying to get ready. They immediately open the door because they’ve been anticipating this moment. They’re not caught off guard. They’re not frantically trying to clean up their life or get their spiritual house in order at the last second. They’re ready because they’ve been living in a state of readiness all along.
Stay Alert or Miss Everything That Matters
Being alert means you’re paying attention. You’re tuned in. You’re not so distracted by everything competing for your attention that you miss what God is actually doing right in front of you.
This is harder than it sounds in our current cultural moment. Entertainment is endless. News cycles are relentless. Social media is designed to capture and hold your attention. The temptation to tune out, numb out, or check out is everywhere. Even well-meaning Christians can find themselves so overwhelmed by the state of the world that they’d rather not look at the news, not engage with difficult realities, not think too hard about what’s coming.
But that’s not what believers are called to. We’re supposed to understand the times. We’re supposed to be watching. Not with anxiety, but with spiritual alertness. Jesus didn’t say “hide your head in the sand.” He said “be alert.”
Here’s the thing about alertness—it requires consistency. You can’t check in with God once a month and expect to have sharp spiritual discernment. Sometimes you show up for prayer and Bible reading and it feels like nothing. The words seem flat. The prayers feel like they’re hitting the ceiling. But those consistent, even mundane moments are building something in you. They’re training you to recognize God’s voice, to notice when He’s moving, to sense when something significant is happening.
Think about it like this: if you only check your doorbell camera once every few weeks, you’re going to miss a lot of deliveries. You might miss important visitors. You’ll certainly miss anything time-sensitive. But if you’re regularly aware, regularly checking, regularly paying attention, you catch things as they happen. You can respond in real time instead of discovering later what you missed.
The same principle applies spiritually. Consistent attention means you’re positioned to act when God opens doors. You recognize opportunities others miss. You sense when something is off before it becomes a crisis. You have the confidence to move when God directs because you’ve been staying close enough to hear His voice clearly.
What Happens When You Get the Waiting Right
Here’s where it gets really good. Jesus says that when the master returns and finds his servants alert, ready, and expectant, something unexpected happens. The master doesn’t just acknowledge their faithfulness and move on. He has them sit down, and then He serves them.
Read that again. The Master serves the servant.
This is the ultimate picture of what God does for those who faithfully wait on Him with genuine expectation. All the preparation, all the consistency, all the spiritual alertness—it leads to a place where God Himself meets every single need you have. No more striving. No more anxiety about whether you have enough. No more wondering if you’re doing enough or being enough. You enter into rest, and God takes care of everything.
That’s heaven, ultimately. That’s the eternal reality believers are moving toward. But there’s a present-day application too. When you live in faithful expectation of God, you start experiencing His provision and care in ways that go beyond what you could orchestrate yourself. You see Him show up in your circumstances. You experience His rescue when you need it. You develop a confidence in your faith that doesn’t come from positive thinking or self-help strategies—it comes from repeatedly watching God deliver on His promises.
The prophet Isaiah, writing to people who would face exile and devastation, gives them this promise: “Yet those who wait for the Lord will gain new strength; they will mount up with wings like eagles, they will run and not get tired, they will walk and not become weary” (Isaiah 40:31). That’s not describing people sitting around doing nothing. That’s describing people who are actively, expectantly trusting God in the midst of really hard circumstances, and finding that He gives them supernatural strength to keep going.
James echoes this when he tells believers to “be patient, brethren, until the coming of the Lord. The farmer waits for the precious produce of the soil, being patient about it, until it gets the early and late rains. You too be patient; strengthen your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is near” (James 5:7-8). The farmer doesn’t just throw seeds on the ground and walk away. He tends the field. He watches for the rains. He expects the harvest because he knows how the process works.
Moving From Passive to Active in Your Walk With God
If you’ve been treating your relationship with God like sitting on that stalled bus—frustrated, passive, watching time pass without really expecting anything to change—it’s time to shift your approach. This isn’t about manufacturing emotion or forcing yourself to feel something you don’t. It’s about making practical decisions that position you to experience God in deeper ways.
Start with the basics that actually work. Set a consistent time each day for Scripture and prayer, even if it’s just fifteen minutes. Don’t wait until you feel motivated or inspired—just show up. Some days it’ll feel powerful. Other days it’ll feel routine. Both matter. The consistency is building something in you that you won’t fully recognize until you need it.
Pay attention to what God is already doing around you. Look for where He’s moving in your circumstances, your relationships, your community. Ask Him to open your eyes to opportunities you’re missing. Practice recognizing His voice by learning what He sounds like in Scripture. The better you know the written Word, the easier it becomes to recognize when God is speaking to you personally.
Get honest about the distractions that are keeping you spiritually dull. Maybe it’s the amount of time you spend scrolling. Maybe it’s how you’ve structured your evenings. Maybe it’s relationships that drain your spiritual energy without giving anything back. You don’t have to become a hermit, but you do need to be intentional about protecting your spiritual alertness.
And here’s the big one: actually expect God to show up. When you pray about something, anticipate that He’s going to answer. When you ask for wisdom, expect Him to provide it. When you need provision or direction or strength, confidently trust that He’s going to come through. Not because you’ve earned it or deserve it, but because He’s promised it, and He keeps His promises.
The waiting season you’re in right now—whether it’s waiting for healing, provision, direction, breakthrough, or just the return of Christ—doesn’t have to be wasted time. It can be the season that prepares you for everything God wants to do next in your life. The question is whether you’ll wait like someone stuck on a bus in a storm, or like someone who’s actively preparing for the moment when the door opens and everything you’ve been trusting God for becomes reality.
Because here’s the promise: when He finds you ready, alert, and expectant, He doesn’t just meet your needs. He serves you Himself. And that kind of relationship with God—that kind of confidence in His faithfulness—is worth every moment of patient, active, expectant waiting.
Peace,
Todd