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There is a particular kind of tired that only comes from waiting.
Not the tired of a hard day. The tired of month eleven. The work that has not come. The test result that keeps getting pushed back. The person you keep praying for who is exactly the same as last year. You have done the sensible things. You have prayed about it more than once. Nothing has moved.
Most lists of Bible verses about waiting on God hand you the famous ones and leave quickly. This one stays longer. Every verse below is quoted in exact King James wording, and the list keeps the uncomfortable ones too – the verses where waiting goes badly, and the man who announced out loud that he was finished waiting.
And there is one verse almost nobody quotes, where God is the one doing the waiting.
The Core Bible Verses About Waiting on God
Start with the ones people reach for most, in the wording they actually have.
“Wait on the LORD: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the LORD.”
Psalm 27:14, KJV
“I wait for the LORD, my soul doth wait, and in his word do I hope. My soul waiteth for the Lord more than they that watch for the morning: I say, more than they that watch for the morning.”
Psalm 130:5-6, KJV
“The LORD is good unto them that wait for him, to the soul that seeketh him. It is good that a man should both hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the LORD.”
Lamentations 3:25-26, KJV
“But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.”
Isaiah 40:31, KJV
“Rest in the LORD, and wait patiently for him: fret not thyself because of him who prospereth in his way.”
Psalm 37:7, KJV
“Therefore I will look unto the LORD; I will wait for the God of my salvation: my God will hear me.”
Micah 7:7, KJV
“My soul, wait thou only upon God; for my expectation is from him.”
Psalm 62:5, KJV
“Behold, as the eyes of servants look unto the hand of their masters, and as the eyes of a maiden unto the hand of her mistress; so our eyes wait upon the LORD our God, until that he have mercy upon us.”
Psalm 123:2, KJV
That last one is worth a second look. The picture is a servant watching an employer’s hand – not their face, their hand – because the hand is where the next instruction comes from. It is the posture of someone who expects to be given something to do.
Nine of These Verses Are Not About God at All
Here is something you can check yourself. Search a complete King James Bible for every verse that uses a form of the word “wait” beside a name for God, and fifty verses come back.
Nine of those fifty have nothing to do with waiting on God.
- Five are about an ambush. Exodus 21:13, 1 Samuel 15:2, 1 Samuel 22:13, Ezra 8:31 and Psalm 59:3 all use “lie in wait” or “laid wait” – men hidden beside a road, waiting to attack.
- Four are about staff on duty. In 1 Chronicles 6:32, 1 Chronicles 23:28, 2 Chronicles 7:6 and 2 Chronicles 13:10, priests and Levites “wait on” their office and their business. It means they are working.
So the same English word is carrying three jobs: an ambush, a shift at work, and a soul waiting on God. Whatever else that word meant to the translators, it did not mean doing nothing. An archer in the long grass is not relaxing. Neither is a waiter at a table.
The Hebrew behind the most famous of these verses points the same direction, and we unpacked it in The Hebrew Word for ‘Wait’ Isn’t Passive. But you do not need Hebrew to notice this one. It is sitting in the English.
Three of Them Say It Twice
Read the waiting verses next to each other and a habit shows up. The writer says it, and then says it again in the same breath.
- Psalm 27:14 – “Wait on the LORD… wait, I say, on the LORD.”
- Psalm 130:5-6 – “I wait for the LORD, my soul doth wait“… then “more than they that watch for the morning: I say, more than they that watch for the morning.”
- Isaiah 25:9 – “we have waited for him, and he will save us: this is the LORD; we have waited for him.”
Nobody repeats themselves about an easy thing. You repeat yourself when you are not sure the other person believes you, or when you are steadying yourself. “Wait, I say” is the sound of someone saying it a second time because the first time did not quite hold.
And look at what Psalm 130 compares it to. Watchmen on a night shift, waiting for morning. They are not waiting to find out whether the sun will come up. Morning is the one thing nobody has to hope for. It is simply not here yet.
The Bible Does Not Pretend Waiting Is Easy
This is the part that usually gets left off a verse list, and it is the part that makes the rest trustworthy.
“I am weary of my crying: my throat is dried: mine eyes fail while I wait for my God.”
Psalm 69:3, KJV
Not “my faith is being refined.” My eyes are failing. My throat is dry. This is a body wearing out.
“And I will wait upon the LORD, that hideth his face from the house of Jacob, and I will look for him.”
Isaiah 8:17, KJV
Read that slowly. The prophet says he will wait on a God who is hiding. He does not claim it feels good. He states the hiding as a fact and says he is staying anyway.
Then there is the sentence that should probably not have survived. Samaria is under siege in 2 Kings 6. The famine is so bad that the chapter records a mother who has eaten her own son. The king of Israel hears it, tears his clothes, and sends for the prophet Elisha. Then he says this:
“Behold, this evil is of the LORD; what should I wait for the LORD any longer?”
2 Kings 6:33, KJV
A man in the Bible quits waiting, out loud, in front of witnesses. And the sentence was kept.
Here is what happens next. Not years later. The very next verse:
“Then Elisha said, Hear ye the word of the LORD; Thus saith the LORD, To morrow about this time shall a measure of fine flour be sold for a shekel… in the gate of Samaria.”
2 Kings 7:1, KJV
He said he was done waiting. The answer was one day out.
He had no way of knowing that. Neither do you. That is the entire difficulty, and the text does not talk you out of it – it just records that the man who gave up was closer than he thought.
One Verse Puts God on the Waiting Side
Now the verse that changes the shape of the whole list.
Isaiah 30 is not a gentle chapter. God offers the people rest, and they refuse it and run for horses instead:
“In returning and rest shall ye be saved; in quietness and in confidence shall be your strength: and ye would not. But ye said, No; for we will flee upon horses.”
Isaiah 30:15-16, KJV
That is the setup. A people told to stay still who bolted. And then, three verses later:
“And therefore will the LORD wait, that he may be gracious unto you… blessed are all they that wait for him.”
Isaiah 30:18, KJV
Read the two halves together. In the first half, God waits. In the second half, the people who wait are called blessed. One verse, both parties doing it.
And notice the reason given. God waits “that he may be gracious unto you.” The waiting is not a delay in being kind. The waiting is how the kindness arrives – because the people had just proved they would not sit still long enough to receive anything.
Which means the long quiet you are in may not be an empty room with God somewhere else, on the other side of a door marked “later.” It may be two parties in the same room, both waiting.
What This Changes While You Are Still Waiting
None of this shortens your wait. A verse list cannot do that, and you would not believe it if it claimed to.
What it changes is what the silence means. If God is also waiting, the silence is not absence and it is not a verdict on you. The watchmen in Psalm 130 are not waiting to see whether morning will come. They are standing in the dark before a thing that is already on its way.
And you are allowed to say the hard sentence while you wait. Psalm 69 says the eyes fail. Isaiah 8 says the face is hidden. The king in 2 Kings 6 said he was finished. None of them were struck down for it, and one of them was a day away from bread. If waiting is something God does too, then telling God the truth about how long it feels is not a failure of faith. It is just talking to someone who is in the room.
For the famous verse in that list and the argument it answers, see Isaiah 40:31 Explained. And for the word that often gets confused with waiting, there is Bible Verses About Patience.
Actions to Take
- Write down the date it started. One line, on paper or in your phone: the thing, and roughly when you began waiting for it. Waiting with no measurement feels endless. A date turns it into a length, and a length has an end somewhere.
- Read Isaiah 30:18 out loud, twice. First stop at “that he may be gracious unto you.” Then read the whole verse. Hearing where the sentence pauses is what makes you notice who is waiting.
- Say the hard sentence to God instead of about God. Yours might be “I do not know how much longer I can do this.” Say it out loud, once. The king in 2 Kings 6 said his version in public, and the answer still came the next morning.
Journaling Prompts
- What have you quietly concluded about God because of how long this has taken? Write the conclusion in one blunt sentence, the way you would say it to a friend rather than in a prayer.
- Psalm 69:3 says “mine eyes fail.” Where is the waiting actually landing on you – in your body, in your hope, or in your trust? Be specific about which one.
- If God has been waiting too, what might God be waiting for in you? Not the answer you think is expected – the one you suspect.
A Prayer for a Long Wait
God, I am tired of waiting, and I am not going to pretend otherwise. I do not understand why this is taking so long, and there are days I am not sure anything is coming at all. If you are waiting too, show me what you are waiting for. Keep me sitting on the step, watching the road, until the morning I am waiting for actually comes. Amen.
Discussion Question
Why do you think these verses were kept – the failing eyes, the hidden face, the king who said he was done – instead of only the ones that promise eagles’ wings? Share your thoughts in the comments below.
Share This
- Isaiah 30:18 says God waits too: “therefore will the LORD wait, that he may be gracious unto you.” I have read that verse for years and never once noticed who was doing the waiting.
- A king in 2 Kings 6 said “what should I wait for the LORD any longer?” The answer came the next day. Scripture kept his sentence anyway.
- In the King James Bible the same word used for waiting on God is used for lying in ambush and for staff on duty. Neither one of those is sitting still.
Questions and Answers About Waiting on God
What are the main Bible verses about waiting on God?
The most frequently cited Bible verses about waiting on God are Psalm 27:14 (“Wait on the LORD: be of good courage”), Psalm 130:5-6, Lamentations 3:25-26, Isaiah 40:31 (“they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength”), Psalm 37:7, Micah 7:7, Psalm 62:5 and Psalm 123:2. A search of a complete King James Bible for a form of the word “wait” beside a name for God returns fifty verses in total.
Does the Bible say God waits?
Yes. Isaiah 30:18 in the King James Version reads, “And therefore will the LORD wait, that he may be gracious unto you… blessed are all they that wait for him.” Both halves of that single verse describe waiting: God waits in order to be gracious, and the people who wait are called blessed. The verse comes shortly after Isaiah 30:15-16, where the people are offered rest and refuse it.
What does Isaiah 40:31 say about waiting on God?
Isaiah 40:31 says, “But they that wait upon the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.” It appears at the end of a passage that begins with people complaining in Isaiah 40:27 that their situation is hidden from God, so the promise is addressed to people who already feel overlooked and tired.
Are there Bible verses that admit waiting is hard?
Several. Psalm 69:3 says, “I am weary of my crying: my throat is dried: mine eyes fail while I wait for my God.” Isaiah 8:17 describes waiting on a God “that hideth his face.” And in 2 Kings 6:33, during the siege of Samaria, the king of Israel says out loud, “what should I wait for the LORD any longer?” In the very next verse, 2 Kings 7:1, the prophet Elisha announces that food will be plentiful in Samaria by the following day.
What does it mean to wait on the Lord?
In the King James Bible the English word “wait” is not limited to doing nothing. The same word describes men lying in ambush beside a road (Psalm 59:3, 1 Samuel 15:2) and priests and Levites “waiting on” their office, meaning working at it (1 Chronicles 23:28, 2 Chronicles 7:6). Psalm 123:2 gives the posture directly: eyes fixed on a master’s hand, watching for the next instruction. Waiting on God in these texts means alert, expectant attention rather than passivity.
