God has given us practical wisdom for those times in life when we are waiting on Him to manifest His promises in our lives. In no uncertain terms, God is telling every son and daughter of His: “Don’t wait to celebrate!” God wants you to enjoy the promises He made you, and He wants you to enjoy life while you wait for those promises to realize because God will most certainly bring to pass every promise He makes! Join Dr. Siohvaughn Funches in this fourth installment of the Waiting Room Wisdom series and learn how to celebrate God’s promise in full confidence of its fulfillment.
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Waiting Room Wisdom (Part 4)
We’re going to be continuing on with the series titled Waiting Room Wisdom. This is part four of the series. Before we dive into that, let’s take a moment and pray. I thank you, Heavenly Father for the opportunity to get at the feet of Jesus and to hear his word. I pray that you, the Father of glory will give to each and every one of us the spirit of wisdom, revelation, and the knowledge of Jesus. Let the eyes of our understanding be enlightened all the more that we may know what is the hope of his calling. What are the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe according to the working of His mighty power.
I ask you, Jesus, to expound on the scriptures to us about the things concerning yourself. I thank you, Holy Spirit, that not only will you expound on the scriptures and reveal Jesus to us, but thank you that will cause us to comprehend the scriptures. I thank you for setting us up for a blessing. Let every promise you’ve made, even the things that haven’t been revealed to us yet that are a blessing and benefit of knowing You more, including being transformed into the image of your son, Jesus. Let them be our portion both now and forevermore in Jesus’ name we pray, Amen.
The last episode was uniquely interesting. At the beginning of this journey, when the episode commenced that one of the things that I am in full agreement with God is that God will be the one speaking through me in this show that it won’t be me. This isn’t a show of opinions, nor where people obtain some self-help from another human being. I’m someone who firmly believes that we need God. I’m not someone that in my own life, seeks myself for wisdom or guidance and I don’t allow myself to make any moves in my life. I’m someone who will seek God. I want God to lead me. I need God’s wisdom. I asked for it on a daily basis.
I remember even praying once, “God, give me your wisdom. If I forget, don’t you forget and you give me your wisdom because in every day, and in every way I need you, even if I somehow don’t acknowledge that right in this human flesh.” There are many things that we could possibly do wrong and not on purpose, but it’s human nature. People have said, “To err is human. To forgive is divine.” I am someone who wants God to use me to be a blessing. To me, I want God to bless me and I want God to be a blessing through me. After all the Bible says, “We are blessed to be a blessing.”
Not that God doesn’t use me every time. He does. I yield to Him to do that. For the most part, I will know ahead of time what direction God is going in and what He’ll want me to say. The spirit is leading me. I’ve prepared for things and God has said other things. I have received a revelation at the same time. Other times, God prepares me ahead of time so I know what the revelation is and what God wants to say before He speaks through me, but the last episode was a surprise to me. In most of my notes, I didn’t go over. I even promised that I would try to remember to go back and give scriptures because it was flowing through me, but I didn’t have the reference to give at that time.
Hopefully, that is something that even helps you all stay at ease and encourage you to continue on this journey with me knowing that, “This isn’t a woman who’s trying to direct my steps or give me some of her wisdom through her experience, but she is taking time to let God lead her and she’s giving whatever he gives her to give to me.” In other episodes, certainly from the beginning to the end, proof of that in a way that it hadn’t been so far. God is not only doing this for us, but He’s taken us from level to level and glory to glory. In declaring that it’s getting better and that’s good.
I’m excited that God is with us and there’s so much I’m learning as well. I often say this when I’m on stage, but I’m in the audience at the same time. I loved that and it’s humbling. I thank God for that too, because there are many opportunities to fall into pride. I thank God for what he’s doing on this show. I thank God for you. Thank you for being with me on this journey. I don’t take that lightly. One can put 1,000 to flight, but 10,000, and there are many readers. I’m grateful for that power. That’s an agreement. I’m grateful for your virtual company until we are able to embrace each other again. Hopefully, that will happen soon.
Wisdom Is The Principal Thing
We started off this series with the key scripture that God had given. From Proverbs 4:7. It says, “Wisdom is the principal thing. Therefore, get wisdom. In all your getting, get understanding.” God began the journey, reminding and teaching us how important wisdom is. If there’s something you want to pray for on a daily basis, it would be wisdom. If there’s any trial you’re facing, any fresh attack from the enemy, the first thing you want to do is crying out to God, for help is to ask for wisdom. That’s for sure. I thank God for reminding us of that and how important that is in everything.
In everything, wisdom is a principal thing. It’s a primary thing. It’s not something you go seven days into a challenge and then pray for wisdom. You want to do that almost immediately, maybe seven seconds in. You’re then like, “God, give me the wisdom I need for this,” because wisdom is vital and wisdom it’s something wonderful that it can navigate you in such a way that you’re delivered faster. It can navigate you in such a way that what was supposed to be on a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being the most challenging, and for you, you coasted through as a one in the challenge because you had the wisdom and it certainly is a way for you to win a war without even ever having to lift your hand or raise a fist.
You can relax when you have wisdom. It’s a principle and a very powerful thing. For the born again believer, Jesus has been made on to us wisdom. That is great news. I did go back in the last episode and I want to give this to you. If you go to Luke 1, that’s where you can find God revealing Himself to us through the life of Elizabeth. That was the barren woman and her husband’s Zacharias. Those were the parents of John the Baptist who prepared the way of the Lord Jesus. That’s an important child, to say the least. We discussed how she was barren and her husband was old. She was beyond the years of having a child plus barren. It was against them, but God was for them. That was more than enough because when John the Baptist came and not only that, he fulfilled his purpose and walked in the will of God.
We went to 1 Samuel. We talked about Hannah, who the Bible says was womb was closed by the Lord, but she prayed anyway. This was when God was talking to us about persevering in prayer. The Lord opened her womb and not only to have Samuel, her son who also was a child that was used heavily by God and a prophet that the Bible says, not one word. He spoke, fell to the ground, but God opened her womb to have several other children as well. That’s recorded in 1 Samuel 1. This is our God and he exceeds our prayer request so let’s pray. We talked about John 2. This is where Jesus’ first miracle is recorded. John was the last of the four gospels and Jesus turned the water into wine.
I say to many people, Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever. He was at a wedding when He did this which is by no means a coincidence. Married people, wherever there is water and you force yourself to drink it. Jesus turned it into the best wine and He’s the same, Jesus. He was willing to do it for them and for you. God talked to us about this particular miracle of pleasure and we learn not to be afraid to ask God, not only for what we need but for what we desire.
Not only did Jesus turn it into wine, but He also turned it into the best wine, the Bible records. God, over-answers prayers and we saw that his mom, Mary, was asking Him and Jesus’ response didn’t seem indicative of Him going to comply with her request. However, Mary had faced, she knew enough about Jesus that even though what she heard or what was on the outside, even the words that came out of the mouth of Jesus, she knew to keep persevering. There was a woman in the Bible who was a Gentile and she’d asked Jesus to cast the devil out of her daughter. Jesus said, “The deliverance is the children’s bread.”
He’s referring to the children of Israel, the Jewish people. “Why should we take that bread and give it to the little dogs?” This was a testing of her faith. Jesus is not grudging. He clearly is a giver. If you’ll give your life, which is the greatest you could give, certainly the lesser is included in the greater. Jesus went and tested this woman’s faith and sure enough, she persevered passed the fact that she wasn’t Jewish and even the worst that came out of the mouth of Jesus, that seemed to be not complying with her request like Mary.
She knew enough and had heard enough about Jesus, that she pushed passed that. She passed that test when she did. It didn’t bother Jesus. He was not offended. Jesus likes us to take from Him. He is a giver. That’s His position in our walk with the Lord now, and even in heaven. It’ll continue to be our position that we are the receivers and He’s the giver. When it comes to our relationships with one another, it’s better to give than it is to receive. When it comes to the Lord, it’s what can we give that He didn’t first give us anyway?
The answer is nothing and no one. We don’t want to be out of gas like Martha, the sister of Mary who was trying to serve Jesus on it. You got to get from Him and then you can serve, but it’s more important. Jesus said, “The Son of man didn’t come to be served, but to serve.” We got to remember that. That is Jesus’s position. He’s the teacher where the student teachers serve. That’s how come they get a salary. Students are not getting paid. The teachers are because the teachers are the ones working. They’re the ones giving out to the students. They’re pouring out to them and whatever they’ve learned, that’s age-appropriate. They’re teaching it to them. That’s moral lessons and values, as well as the material in the particular lesson.
They’re givers, and Jesus is the teacher. He said, “We are the students.” He’s the bread of life. We’re the ones who are hungry and thirsty after Him. We are humbling ourselves, taking our place and Jesus loves it. He ordained it. He made everything on purpose with a purpose. He could’ve made us without needs, but we have needs on purpose. Certainly, they cause us to draw near to God in ways that I don’t believe we would draw near to God without them. Even our needs are a blessing. God even works that together for our good. We talked about the persistent. That’s in Luke 18 where Jesus was teaching us about praying and not giving up. The Holy Spirit revealing and reminding us to be persistent in prayer and giving us plenty of biblical examples to keep push and passed it.
Don’t Wait To Celebrate
Even if you feel like God is the one who allowed this or has closed this door. Persistent prayer with God. God will certainly reward those who diligently seek Him. That’s literally written. I wanted to talk more about what we shouldn’t do? What are we supposed to not do when we’re in this waiting room? God sometimes manifest miracles instantaneously and this has manifestations, because the Bible says, as far as answering our prayers, God answers us before we even open our mouth to speak. That’s how much God loves to give. He’s going before you and give it to you.
It’s God who puts desires in your heart and gives you dreams. Sometimes, you think you want something so much and come to find out God has given you that desire and He’s also given you the strength to want certain things so that you won’t give up. Even when many people tell you, “It’s not God’s will. Look how long it’s been,” or whatever they may erroneously say something in you seems to not be able to let it go in a sense. You’re like, “I know there’s come hail and there’s come high water, but I still believe God. No matter how many decades it’s been, but I still believe God.” Abraham and Sarah did. We know where that got them. He’s the father of faith and Sarah’s considered the mother of us all as born again believers.
It got them real far is what I’m telling you. With God in the earth, they were blessed, rich and in money and material possessions, but in many other ways, and their descendants were blessed because of their relationship with God. Their descendants here, relationships with God don’t get me wrong, but they were blessings that came upon their children and God will continuously say, “Why was he doing it?” He didn’t hide that ball. Even though these people had a relationship with God, He would tell him, “This is happening because of what I swore to your father, Abraham, to give them.”
There are blessings that God has for us as new covenant believers, for being sons and daughters of Abraham. There are certain things God will do and has done and manifested in our life. Not even because of our relationship with Him or our personal favor that we have with God, but because of what He promised to Abraham. He still performing His promise to Abraham and His descendants, which are us, spiritual descendants, to this day. Clearly, Abraham was on to something by the grace of God.
We’re going to talk about what not to do while you’re in this waiting room. This is one of my favorite Bible verses. No matter how many times you read it, it always does you good, you don’t get tired of it. One of those is the entire passage in Isaiah 54 is one of my favorites. It is for various reasons, from the beginning of it throughout it to the very end. God was in revealing to me what not to do while we wait. This is we for sure because there are things that I’m still waiting on God to manifest in my life. I know that He most definitely will. This is God’s joy to do so. When the Lord was teaching me this, He took me to Isaiah 54:1, “This is in teaching you and my people something that you don’t want to do while you’re waiting.”
God said, “Don’t wait to celebrate.” There are people who are in the waiting room and it’s almost holding their breath in a sense. I’m anticipating the coming. This is good in this way. If you’re in the waiting room, that means you’ve come to God. If you’ve come to God, the Bible says, “You must believe that He exists and that He’s a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.” High five from God. I know He’s proud of you in letting Him work that in you and through and me as well. I’m happy and glad. You will hear me clapping and cheering you on for sure.
The part about holding the breath and waiting to celebrate once you see the manifestation is an error. I say it as respectfully as I’m on the stage, but I’m also in the audience. We can’t do that. God had given us an example earlier on when he was talking about waiting room wisdom and the metaphor, if you have a family and surgery, but when it came to this particular part, interestingly, as you read Isaiah 54:1, it’s appropriate. God gave me a different illustration, still with the doctors, still at the hospital, still in that waiting room, but this time you’re not waiting for the family member to have surgery. This time is waiting for a family member to deliver a baby.
There’s much excitement in the waiting room. God wants the excitement and the anticipation of that. The sitting and waiting; sitting as in a place of trusting God; and waiting is fine, but we can’t wait for the celebration part when we have it. We will celebrate when we have it. We don’t want to wait to celebrate. You see that even in the book of Esther, they were going after their enemies got to given them the neck of their enemies and the very plot that they had against Esther and Mordecai, her uncle, and all the Jewish people of that day turned around on their own head. That book is a prime example of what God means when he says, “When evil digs a ditch for the children of God, the spirit will fall into the ditch which he dug and the child of God escaped safely.”
It’s like, “Here I am again.” It’s one of my favorite Bible books. I love the Book of Esther. There it is again. I told you that was going to happen or you should have imagined that that was going to happen, but I love it because we all at times have spiritual and even natural enemies that try to come against us. In the book of Esther, to me, no other demonstrates how God works heavily behind the scene. Nothing that they could see with their eyes looked any help, any favor, any way out, but they had their prayers, they were touching and agreeing. Even fasted in the book of Esther. Jesus says, “Some things only come by praying and fasting.” They did both and that was good.
God was working behind the scenes even before they opened their mouth to pray. If you get a chance to get a copy of the book that God wrote through me, the second one, You Gotta Let God Finish! is the title of that book. There’s this whole section devoted to God drawing truths from the Book of Esther. If you’re somebody who’s being attacked in any way, you have got to not only read the Book of Esther but get ahold of that book that God wrote through me. This show is something that God did through me. I’m not saying that to promote a book, I’m saying that because I know that God poured Himself out. I know He did on those pages.
I’m not that smart to come up with that. That’s all God and none of me. I insure you, that book from beginning to end is something that God wrote to me before He wrote it through me. I needed it, that God was telling me and sent confirmation, even through my mom to let me know, “I know you wrote it. Of course, you’ve been reading it and studying, but you’ve read it. You’ve gotten these revelations in a way to store them and set them to the side and for you to give to others.” God let me know in no uncertain terms, “This is not something you’re passing along to others, this is the bread that you must eat and share the basket full of bread and the leftovers with your family,” which is you all who are born again or believers. We’re sons and daughters of God that makes us brothers and sisters in Christ.
If somebody going through that now or you know someone who is, I’m telling you, because I know who authored that book and it’s God himself. I merely was the one who pinned it. Trust me when I tell you that. I still to this day, I have my own copy. Bookmark is in it because there are certain things that I go through and God sends me to certain chapters and helps deliver me from the inside out. Those books He’s written through me are God breeds like the show. I encourage you to do that.
In that particular story, you do get to see how God works behind the scenes. He answered your prayers before you even open your mouth to speak and how He shows that they didn’t wait to celebrate. Esther was given a banquet and a feast for her husband while there was a decree, which in those days if a judge issued it, there was no appellate court or Supreme court you could appeal to. Once the King made a decree, it was set in stone and He Himself couldn’t say, “Never mind. I don’t want that.” Too little too late in the Kingdom of Persia where they were at once a king decreed, something you were going to literally meet God to get you out of it.
Not even the King could get you out of it. The same King that had the power to put you in a situation didn’t even have the power or to put you out of it. That’s how powerful the decree was. We can learn something from that because God said, “Whatsoever we decreed is established.” We ought to be wise and wisdom for God before we decree a thing. If this Persian King had that power and God said that it’s the same power that raised Jesus from the dead. The Holy Spirit is living in us. We got to be mindful of what we say. We got to do that.
Interestingly, she held a banquet twice. There are feasting, eating, singing, and dancing. Not only did she participate in it, but God gave her the idea to conceive it and give birth to it. She was the party planner, as well as the one who’s enjoying and doing that. This was all before God gave them the breakthrough in the miracle that they absolutely need it. She knew the trouble they were in. This decree said, “Kill all the Jews,” and she’s Jewish. The devil had a sharp knife to her throat and she’s planning the party. Esther is a prime example of not waiting to celebrate and sure enough, her celebration, prayers, praise to God, her honoring God by demonstrating trust, not in her heart, it bearing fruit by her celebrating. Celebrating is an absolute fruit of trusting God when you celebrate in the waiting room.
Those are prime examples of people who trust God. When you get that part first, you let God give you that trusting first, and it should produce the fruit of celebrating. Remember the Bible says that the joy of the Lord is our strength. While waiting, even though this seems to be an activity that is inactive in a sense, it’s not inactive. It takes a whole lot of strength, whole a lot of Holy Spirit to wait for the way that God wants us in this human flesh. I know, from personal experience, He’s able to do this through us. God said, the joy of the Lord is our strength and you need strength for the wait.
How do you get the strength? Through the joy of the Lord. You rejoice in the Lord. The Bible says, “Rejoice in the Lord always.” I love that song. You said, “Always,” but the song follows up, “And again, I say rejoice,” because for any new challenge is a new reminder of not only for wisdom but, “God give me new joy, fresh joy, rejoicing, strength to celebrate and praise you.” You get the people that were in Second Chronicles 20:17 and that’s something in the Bible that I loved. The Bible is big. Don’t think I’m saying this about every single passage.
In this one, I thank God because those people’s life also was in danger. Someone had come to attack King Jehoshaphat and the people that he ruled over at that time. They too had a knife to their throat, gun to their head, nothing less than their actual lives were going to be taken, unless God answered them. Before the miracle took place, the Bible says that they praise God. King Jehoshaphat sent people out and assign them to praises. This was intentional. He didn’t say, “These people who praise maybe felt like it.” That’s why the Bible at one point talks about praise and sacrifice of praise. God spoke that through King David, who we know face many challenges in life. He was the one who God pan the words, the afflictions of the righteous are many, but the Lord delivers him from them all.
You want to not wait to celebrate. David didn’t. He wrote a lot of his Psalms in the valley. Literal valleys hiding from King Saul at that time, because he was trying to murder him. In the spiritual valley, when he did things that even himself he felt was unthinkable, what he had even done, what he saw happened in his own flesh, and what he let his own flesh do through him. He didn’t wait to celebrate either. We see victory after victory in his life. He’s praising God, not when God answers, but he’s praising God while he was in the waiting room. He had some waiting rooms with the knife to his jugular vein and he had guns to both sides of his temple because it was Saul and his whole army coming after them.
You can’t wait to celebrate. Even the children of Israel before they went out, they had the Passover, which was like a feast. That was a celebration and it was a way of demonstrating trust towards God. it was a shadow of that actual substance is Jesus Christ. He’s our Passover lamb.
I may not celebrate it the way that they did. I do celebrate God for being the God who delivered them out of Egypt and away from someone as strong as Pharaoh with all his resources, probably a multi-billionaire back then in terms of wealth now, and with everything that was coming against them, they also had a threat of life. It was against them. It’s a knife against the jugular vein, gun to the temple. One would do it, but they had both on their backs. They didn’t wait to celebrate.
I’m going to stop on purpose because I don’t want to rush this and we can pick back up with Isaiah 54. If you want to, you can have your Bibles ready. I’m going to be reading out of the New King James version, but we can see with the examples of the Holy Spirit gave us that one of the things we don’t do in the waiting room for certain is we don’t wait to celebrate. We’ll look at Isaiah 54 and on Luke with the mother of Jesus, Mary, and see how she didn’t wait to celebrate.
Her miracle and promise came to pass. It came to pass shortly thereafter. There’s something about celebrating in praise and worshiping God. It can be with going out to dinner or cooking your favorite meal and even raising your wine glass for a toast. God wants us to celebrate it. Remember your God created holidays. It is His will that we celebrate and rejoice. Not only when we get the miracle, but even while we wait. I love you all. I know that it’s blessed us and it blessed me too. Thank you for being with me on this journey. If anybody wants that resource, you got to let God finishes the name of that book. Until next time. God bless you and cover you with the blood of Jesus, your family, the possessions He has for you, all He has for you, let it be under the blood of Jesus, in Jesus’ name, we pray. Have a fantastic week.
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