An Invitation to Learn, Lean, and Wait

By Sandy Mayle

More and more, I believe in the God of long answers. In fact, the reason I do is a long answer in itself.

As a young adult, I wanted to learn to improvise on the piano—to add unwritten notes to the music I played in church, and to segue smoothly from one song to another. With some years of piano study behind me, a bit of instruction was all I needed. So I shared my aspirations with a local graduate of Eastman School of Music. She agreed to teach me.

“But I think we ought to start with some studies in theory and keys and chord structure,” she said after assessing my level of expertise. (I’d been taught more hows than whys.) “That will give you the foundation needed to play as you want to.”

I reluctantly agreed, and we dug in. To my dismay, however, long stretches went by without any mention of my goal. Month after month I dutifully repeated Hanon piano exercises and labored over Glover theory workbooks while wanting to soulfully embellish “How Great Thou Art.”  Inwardly, I began to wonder if she even remembered my initial request. Was she stringing me along for the money? Did she just enjoy an adult pupil after hours with restless youngsters? My skills were definitely improving, though, so I persevered.

As you can guess, I eventually learned that she had not forgotten my goal. We had indeed been working toward just that, having the more advanced workbooks at hand and ready to produce when I mastered the all-important basics.

Although today I am no virtuoso, I can improvise at the piano, based on the foundation built during long stretches of silence and diligent—if sometimes doubtful—obedience.

Long Time Coming

Sometimes when I pray, things happen quickly. It’s as though God has His reply teetering on the edge of heaven: “Quick, ask! Here comes the answer!”

More often, it seems, that answer is a long time coming. From all indications, God has forgotten my request. But I’m learning that more is going on during those long stretches of silence and apparent inactivity than I thought.

After five years of marriage, my husband Dave and I announced to our family that we were finally ready for children. I assume we prayed for that first child-to-be. Mostly, I recall that we assumed. Assumptions turned to prayers, though, when, as time passed, I did not become pregnant.

The ensuing years of infertility were marked by doctor visits, testing, medicine, and disappointment. They were also marked by a deep sense of inadequacy and a longing to crawl under a rock and hide from continual failure. Frankly, I wanted to consider it all a “short no” from God. I was ready to concede parenthood.

But God was bent on revisiting the foundations of my life, where I was an unstable blend of the wise man who built on the rock of obedience to Christ’s words and the foolish man who failed to put His words into practice (Matt. 7:24–27). Scripture says, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding” (Prov. 3:5), but I had not learned to fix my confidence on God and persevere. Although God’s Word says, “Carry each other’s burdens” (Gal. 6:2), I shrank from allowing others to help bear mine.

And so God brought alongside me a dear pastoral couple who, with scandalous frequency, month after month, gathered one depressed me (along with a feisty widow named Olive) just to laugh and eat and play UNO. He enlisted the quiet support of family and the not-so-subtle efforts of church friends to encourage me. (I can still see women furtively arranging for my gift at another woman’s baby shower to be the seventh one opened—a “sure sign” I was the next mother-to-be.)

And just when I wanted to give up, Dave persuaded me to take the medication one more month. Nine months later, we welcomed James David Mayle. This journey to motherhood taught me some all-important basics: the Fellowship of Suffering, the Danger of Despair, and the Value of Persistent Community. These are some weight-bearing underpinnings that are rarely constructed from instantaneous answers to prayer. God’s long answers are always accompanied by invitations to learn more and lean more while waiting on Him.

The God of Expansive Explanation

In more recent years I became reacquainted with the minister of my childhood. Bob was a reserved individual, and I’d had little interaction with him as a youngster. Yet he had always been “my pastor.” I guess with the common exodus of young people from our congregation, he considered me one of his success stories, a fruit of his labors. Now he delighted in long conversations, frequently inserting anecdotes from the past. A story from his youth would serve to illustrate a point; a dilemma would remind him of advice from a famous saint.

Sometimes he would apologize with, “I’m probably boring you with all these stories.” And I must admit, I did find my mind wandering at times. But other times, nothing but his stories communicated more clearly.

I remember the day we discussed my family’s leaving the denomination (for the second and final time). He could have said, “I’m devastated—again.” And I would have understood that he felt sadness about it.  Instead, Bob unfolded a narrative of the time he lacerated his leg during some boyish endeavor. Days later, he rode his bicycle again, despite the injury, and had an accident. As he hit the ground, the half-healed wound viciously reopened.

He concluded his story, saying that the news of our final departure from the denomination brought him that same excruciating pain.

I’d had no idea. Bob’s “long version” communicated the depths of his heart in ways brief comments could not have done. It deepened our friendship.

I like it when God keeps the conversation moving, because sometimes, like Bob, He loses me in the long backtracking and “remember when” and “consider this.” My eyes glaze over. My mind wanders. He wants to send me digging into Scriptures or embarking on a new spiritual discipline. He simply waits for me to keep on asking. I wonder why He doesn’t get to the point.

And finally He does get to the point, sometimes with a coup de grâce that leaves me speechless. How could any quick reply have packed the cumulative punch that His long answer delivered? What grace, that He cares enough to open His heart and give me the full-length version whether I want to hear it or not. He takes time to instill truth through repetition—layer upon layer of study, illustration, discipline, revelation, and dialogue.

“I wait for the Lord,” the psalmist wrote, “my whole being waits, and in his word I put my hope” (Ps. 130:5). Like that writer, I’m learning to wait, too, and listen more patiently to God’s extended replies.

Stop and Study Joy

Recently, in the throes of chronic illness and a newly emptied nest, I felt my spirit bogging down. For months, emptiness, sadness, and negative thoughts bombarded me. Alone on a personal retreat, I begged the Lord to take these away and renew my jaded heart.

His answer: Philippians—the book of joy. Spend the next three months in Philippians. Read it over and over. Read it in different translations. Study it. Study what others have written about it. Memorize from it.

So I carefully read Chuck Swindoll’s Laugh Again, based on Paul’s letter to Philippi. Then I worked though John MacArthur’s Philippians 12-week study guide. Meanwhile, and most importantly, I prayerfully studied the Book of Philippians itself, writing key verses on memory cards and memorizing “glad verses” such as these from The Living Bible:

• “I am going to keep on being glad, for I know that as you pray for me, and as the Holy Spirit helps me, this is all going to turn out for my good” (1:19).
• “Whatever happens, dear friends, be glad in the Lord” (3:1).
• “Always be full of joy in the Lord; I say it again, rejoice!” (4:4).
• “Think about all you can praise God for and be glad about” (4:8).

In the process, I came to appreciate Paul’s attitude in that Roman jail. I realized that his outlook was available to me, too, through the Holy Spirit. His words, committed to my memory, brought a new discipline to my mind, courage to my heart, and confidence for the future.

I spent several weeks in Philippians. While I felt the heaviness lift immediately, I took a long time and soaked in that happy book. Like the psalmist, I put my hope in God’s Word and found that God’s “Philippians story” revealed His heart to me and deepened our relationship. He lifted my own heart to say with Paul, “Whatever it takes, I will be one who lives in the fresh newness of life of those who are alive from the dead” (Phil. 3:11, TLB).

He Doesn’t Forget

Yes, more and more I believe in the God of long answers, Oh, I still come to Him with requests for prodigals and problems. I still look for answers to fall off the edge of heaven. There are still some long silences. Some days I tend toward doubt; some days I just hope He hasn’t forgotten.

But I remember the piano instructor’s intentionality. I recall the mentors and Christian friends who have taught me long-term lessons. I think about my three-month visit with Paul and his perspective on waiting on the Lord during difficult times. And I see all over again that in the long reply, God is honoring—not dismissing—my request. He is asking only for my trust and cooperation.

He’s giving me the long answer—and the faith to keep holding on until it comes.

SANDY MAYLE is a freelance writer who has written for both Prayer Connect and the former Pray! magazine. She and her husband Dave are from Erie, PA.