Waiting is Active
חכה
châkâh to wait, wait for, await
“For from days of old no one has heard, no ear perceived, no eye has seen God, except You, who acts on behalf of the one waiting for Him” Isa 64:3 TLV
From this verse alone, there seems to be something involved in waiting for God to act. Hebrew is definitely not English, for in English we have our one word – wait.
“Do you know how long I have been waiting?” I had an appointment for 10:30 and I had to wait until 11:45 to get in. That was a wait!”
Our word here, châkâh is translated “wait.” Its root is châqâh (notice the change from kaf to kopf or k to q) which means to cut, carve or cut in.
This word is used in Job when he says, “You also put my feet in the stocks, and watch all my paths; You set a limit on the soles of my feet.” (Job 13:27) That limit is châqâh and is in the sense of cutting in a limit. Other uses have to do with carving things, like images.
To get to how this word is used, we have to go into the ancient Hebrew to root out the basic idea. The pictograph for chet is a picture of a wall representing a separation. The pictograph for qopf is a picture of the sun at the horizon representing the idea of “coming together”. Combined these mean “separation and coming together”. A custom, the basic root behind the two letter parent root, brings a people separated together. (Jeff Benner, Ancient Hebrew Lexicon, page 129).
Waiting, our word, then carries the idea of writing a decree or custom that brings people together.
How does waiting bring people together, particularly when one of those people is our Creator who this text clearly says “no one has heard, no ear perceived, no eye has seen” eliminating any kind of experience of God’s presence by our sense or sight or sound? We may think that waiting separates but it really brings together.
So how is this a coming or bringing together?
“I have waited for your salvation, O Yehovah.” Gen 49:18. LITV This is another word, qâvâh which means to to wait, look for, hope, expect. And there are other words translated wait (well, this is Hebrew!).
There is yâchal, which simply means to wait, hope, expect and other words which get translated as wait which mean to sit still and be quiet.
How is it then that Yehovah works on behalf of those who wait for him? Do we sit quietly and do nothing, waking up to see nothing has changed and laying down to see nothing has changed and just keep plodding along while we sit silently and quietly?
Hebrew is a verbally based language so doing nothing is not a part of that worldview.
“Hope in Yehovah; be strong and He will make strong your heart; yea, hope in Yehovah! Psa 27:14 LITV. Hope is again qâvâh also in Psalm 37:9 “For evildoers shall be cut off; and the ones waiting (qâvâh) on Jehovah, they shall inherit the earth.” LITV
“I wait (qâvâh) for Jehovah; my soul waits, and I hope for His Word. My soul waits for the Lord more than those watching for the morning.” Psa 130:5 – 6 LITV
When we, like the guards of the city, wait for the morning, we are waiting for more than simply time to pass. We are waiting for the sun to rise and day to break, for the light to replace the darkness, and the cold to be replaced with the warmth of the sun.
Waiting involves an expectation of something special. Waiting means anticipation, expectation, confident hope in something that will take place. Ultimately, waiting on the Lord is like waiting on the sun to rise—waiting expectantly for the Lord’s answers to human needs as the sun brings the warmth of the day. (Mark Wheeler)
We are not just sitting patiently and quietly, like a child outside of the principal’s office waiting to see what the principal will do.
qavah at its root means to bind together, like twisting the strands of string to make a rope. String alone is not strong, but when many strands of string are bound together, they are “waiting” to be put to the test of strength, and the strands together are much stronger than any strand alone.
“And you shall lay these Words up in your hearts, and in your souls, and shall bind them for a sign on your hand. And they shall be for frontlets between your eyes. ” Deut 11:18 is a repeat of Det. 6, known as the shema.
When we bind ourselves to God’s words, we are becoming so intimate with him that in our lives we find we cannot be silent, we cannot sit still. Like Peter and John in Acts 4:20 we will also say “ For we are not able not to speak what we saw and heard.”
Waiting is not inactive, it is acting within the boundaries of one of the holiest of moments. We are twisting ourselves together with God and his promises, and in that twisting we are entering into one of the holiest of places. The place of waiting, where we are alone with our Creator believing he will act according to what he has said.
Bound to our God we wait with him, not for him!