On the wall of our little home gym is a framed photograph of my all-time favourite football player: Walter Payton, the storied halfback for the Super Bowl-winning Chicago Bears of the mid-1980s.
“Sweetness” previously held NFL records for career rushing yards, touchdowns, carries, yards from scrimmage, all-purpose yards, and many other categories. He also retired with the most receptions by a non-receiver, and he threw eight career touchdown passes.
Payton also taught me, however, how to interpret a strange Old Testament verse, and thereby taught me a big lesson about the providence of God.
Running backs normally get the ball from the quarterback and then run as fast as they can either through or around their opponents. But the experienced and savvy running backs know that they will get farther by working well with the big blockers sent out in front of them to mow down some of those opponents before the runner even gets there.
Payton was a master at receiving the ball and then sizing up the situation in front of him. He would keep his legs moving, yes, but often at half speed, or even slower, while he waited for the guards and tackles and tight ends to line up their targets and push them away from him. When the alleyway then opened up, #34 would hit the afterburners and burst through the space.
God speaks to a bewildered prophet Habakkuk that a vision is surely coming to console and direct him:
“For the vision is yet for the appointed time;It hastens toward the goal and it will not fail.Though it tarries, wait for it;For it will certainly come, it will not delay.”
Many Bible readers have stumbled over those last two lines. “Though it tarries . . . it will not delay.” But, not to put too fine a point on it, doesn’t “tarry” just mean “delay”?
Think of Sweetness getting the ball and looking downfield. If he simply runs fast, he may outrun his blockers, or even run into them, and simply get tackled immediately. The quickest way to the most yards to be gained is actually to tarry—and then to move when the time is right.
God moves as quickly as it makes sense to move, and God longs to bring relief to those he loves as soon as possible. So God does not delay.
But God will wisely “tarry”—in order for various processes to unfold such that when he makes that decisive move, the most shalom will be achieved.
I realize that the analogy is only very rough. (Football is a very rough game.) God's omnipotence, one would think, would mean that God doesn't have to wait for others to help him move where God wants to go. He can just head downfield and every would-be tackler would just bounce off.
Think, then, of agricultural parallels instead. If God isn't just going to perform miracles all the time, if God wants to work with things as they are, then he needs to work with things as they are. And that means, often, waiting for them to become what they need to become in order for God then to work with them for an optimal outcome.
“In the fullness of time,” Galatians 4:4 says, “God sent forth his Son.” God’s maximizes the good. God waits for things to ripen and then he harvests.
Sometimes, to be sure, God’s blessing is held up by our own sin. We are not ready to receive it, whether through active resistance to his plan or through passive indifference.
It doesn’t matter why the lamps aren’t lit when the bridegroom finally shows up, whether because of angry antagonism or sheer sloth. We’re not in position to cooperate (Matthew 25:1–12). We can’t blame God for that.
If we are, however, eagerly waiting on God, as Habakkuk was, then we need to trust God and wait. God’s love is strong, God’s wisdom is perfect, God’s power is unmatched, and God’s timing is right.
God is coming to save. He is not delaying. But he is tarrying in order to have maximum impact.
And that’s worth waiting for.
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