Years ago , managers at a Houston airport noticed their customers had lodged many complaints about long waits at baggage claim . Their first solution was to hire more baggage handlers in order to make the loading and unloading process as efficient as possible . And it worked . The average wait time at each baggage claim was only eight minutes . Yet the complaints persisted .
Looking into the issue more deeply , the airport managers realized it took most flyers only a single minute to walk from their gates to baggage claim . Once they arrived , they spent an average of seven minutes waiting for their bags . Those seven minutes seemed to be the root of the problem .
As an experiment , the managers arranged things so that passengers had to walk a longer distance between their gates and baggage claim . After the change , most people walked eight to ten minutes and found their bags waiting when they arrived .
The complaints stopped .
As one researcher noted : “ Americans spend roughly thirty-seven billion hours each year waiting in line . The dominant cost of waiting is an emotional one : stress , boredom , that nagging sensation that one ’ s life is slipping away . The last thing we want to do with our dwindling leisure time is squander it in stasis .” Or , as the old song says , “ The waiting is the hardest part .” David knew much about the pain of waiting . He lived for almost ten years in the terrible tension between God ’ s promise to make him king and Saul ’ s desire to make him dead . David had killed a giant and become a hero — but he had to live the life of a fugitive . He was an anointed king — but he had to live like a beast of the fields . He was desperate . Out of the pain in his heart , he cried out to the Lord . And out of that furnace of his desperation came the incredible words of Psalm 13 .
OUR STRUGGLE WHEN GOD DELAYS
On occasions when you struggle with God ’ s timing , it ’ s good to know these feelings didn ’ t originate with you . Not only did David express the feelings you ’ ve had , but he did so repeatedly . Read through the psalms . So many of them begin with a sigh and end with a song . But in life , you can ’ t take in the song without letting out the sigh .
Just as a song has a refrain , Psalm 13 has one — a recurring phrase that always comes back around : “ How long ?”
That ’ s right , David was singing the blues . He was overwhelmed with a sense of the permanence of trouble . Trouble springs up when we want it least , seems to have no solution , seems to mock our most diligent efforts to lead a happy and peaceful life , and finally consumes our last ounce of patience . And David , much like you , finally lifts his eyes to heaven in exasperation and says , “ How much longer , O God ? How much longer ?”
Aren ’ t you grateful for the psalms that are such remarkable illustrations of honest prayer ? I don ’ t always pray with total honesty , and allow me to guess that you don ’ t either . Your friend at work brushes by you at the copy machine .
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