“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 NASB)
Once upon a time, decades ago, there stood a little white building on the corner of a one-way street. This edifice was a block west of the famous Indiana Avenue, and a block northeast of a building that stands out as today as much as the African American entrepreneur that it is named for, Madam C.J. Walker, the first self-made female millionaire in America. To the left of this little white building was one of the first Black Baptist churches in the state of Indiana. To the right were acres of land that would eventually house a major institution of higher learning that is still expanding.
The little white building housed a doctor’s office, owned and operated by a Black physician who had taken over the practice that her father started. When you entered, you were in the waiting room. You did not have to have an appointment. There was no sign in book or receptionist. You just had to remember when it was your turn to see the doctor.
As I remember the waiting room, I recall that it was a classy room. The floor and the walls were made of a dark wood. There were pictures on the wall and several places you could sit. On the wall was a giant clock that you could hear ticking rhythmically and really loud, for you could hear it even if you were sitting in a seat far away from the clock. Whether there was one patient or many, it was as quiet as you could imagine. It was that type of quietness that we describe by saying, “You could hear a pin drop.” When there were sick people in the waiting room, no one coughed, continually sighed in pain, or conversed with one another. No sign imposed such silence, such serenity, that was just the way it was.
I started seeing this doctor in the 1950’s and continued to do so through my early college years. I don’t know why, but it seemed like every time I visited from my teen years up, the remedy was a shot of fast-healing penicillin. You could claim your celibacy, but that did not matter. It seemed like penicillin was the “go-to” cure for anything and everything. This doctor practiced in the days when doctors made house calls. And come to think of it, I remember getting penicillin shots before my teen years. I may not have like it during any of my years, but the medicine she injected into you, the penicillin, always worked.
Back to the waiting room. I sometimes had to wait minutes and other times it seems like for hours. But I trusted this physician, so even though it seemed like an eternity, I always waited patiently. And as I described above, I would get the same healing medicine. The wait was well worth it!
This is a true account, but I am sharing it with you because there are times in our lives where we have to go to the office of the Great Physician, the One who never lost a patient. And sometimes, it is necessary for us to be still, sit in blessed quietness, and wait on the Lord. He always shows up in time, or as we say, right on time, or in synch with our much-used declaration, “He may not come when you want Him to, but He is always right on time.” Just like my doctor was “my doctor” back in the day, once upon a time ago, the One we refer to affectionately as “my Doctor,” from a spiritual sense, there are times where we will have to sit, as in a waiting room, not making a sound, not mouthing one complaint, but just making it through as we anxiously await the astute, awesome Doctor give us the remedy we seek. The remedy is always the same, a healing, soothing shot, an injection from the word of God. It always brings about a cure. You just have to trust Him.
Sunday I was preoccupied after morning service, pondering how to regrow the church that I pastor in this post-pandemic area. The “Doctor” made a house visit. He told me to relax and stop trying to figure it out. Just keep praying it out. He changed my disposition with that same healing, soothing shot He always gives. You want to know what it was don’t you? I’m not ashamed to tell you! As a matter of fact, I am glad to share with you. The content of the shot is revealed in the closing verses. Read it! Relax! Sit in the waiting room if necessary and let the spiritual medication below make you better. Things ARE going to get better! Be blessed!
“God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore, will not we fear, though the earth be removed, and though the mountains be carried into the midst of the sea; though the waters thereof roar and be troubled, though the mountains shake with the swelling thereof. Selah. There is a river, the streams whereof shall make glad the city of God, the holy place of the tabernacles of the most High. God is in the midst of her; she shall not be moved: God shall help her, and that right early. The heathen raged, the kingdoms were moved: he uttered his voice, the earth melted. The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge. Selah. Come, behold the works of the Lord, what desolations he hath made in the earth. He maketh wars to cease unto the end of the earth; he breaketh the bow, and cutteth the spear in sunder; he burneth the chariot in the fire. Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth. The Lord of hosts is with us; the God of Jacob is our refuge.” Psalm 46 (King James Version)
Still committed to the climb,
Mark L. King