“AFTER TWO WHOLE YEARS…”
Genesis 41:1
Joseph had been in prison for something he didn’t do. In fact, he chose righteousness when no one was looking. But there was a glimmer of hope after he interpreted the dreams of two other prisoners. One was the king’s cupbearer and the other his baker. But when they got out of prison both of them forgot about Jospeh.
Two years went by. No progress. No movement. No news.
Waiting is one of the greatest tests of our faith. It’s also the training ground of all the greats. Abraham and Sarah waited for a son. Moses wandered in the wilderness. David lived on the run from Saul. Esther waited and prayed for God to rescue her people. Elijah was led into silence and solitude at Cherith. John the Baptist lived in the desert, waiting for his appointed time.
As each of these heroes from history learned to wait, many of us struggle to stop at stop signs and wait for a red light to turn green. We live in a culture of hurry and have more to do than we can handle. Certainly there isn’t time to wait.
The gods of this world expect hustle. Success commands you maximize your time. Mammon demands you outwork the competition. Like me, you probably go from meeting to meeting and project to project. We want to be efficient. But God’s ways are higher than our ways and his ways involve waiting, sometimes years.
The Bible specifically records that Joseph waited “two whole years.” Why? Because waiting equals preparation. If we had same-day delivery from all our trials, they wouldn’t produce perseverance, character, and hope. God isn’t just trying to get things done in the world, he’s getting things done in us, conforming us to the image of his son.
Jesus himself spent 33 years on earth and 30 of those he waited. Waited for his time to come. Waited to begin his life’s work. Timing is everything, some will say. And perhaps they’re right, for when it was time Jesus was ready. Even he had been prepared for his assignment, to give it all, his life, his teaching, his body, his blood.
You probably have something you’re walking through that feels slow in coming. Your plans aren’t coming together. Your spouse hasn’t showed up yet. Your dream job feels as far away as the stars. Your case isn’t closing. Your progress is slower than you’d hoped.
The hardest season of waiting I’ve experienced was when we were adopting our two children. We sped ahead to finish all our paperwork, so eager to meet the kids God would give us. But then nothing happened. Week after week we would go to church and our community would ask, but there was no news. Months dragged on. Then years. It was heartbreakingly slow.
There’s probably a breakthrough you want to happen, an answer you expect to come. How do you stay in the waiting? Amidst our season of adoption, God anchored my faith in one verse from the Bible. When everything in me felt done with waiting, I went back to this verse again and again. That verse is Isaiah 64:4, which says,
From of old no one has heard or perceived by the ear,
no eye has seen a God besides you,
who acts for those who wait for him.
This is really good news. There is no God like ours. He never sleeps nor slumbers. God never runs out of strength and he never forgets about us. While we are waiting, God is working.
Joseph was eventually released and God elevated him to a position of prominence. Joseph was God’s instrument to save a nation, but prison was his training ground. We eventually met our children and brought them home. Today my son turns sixteen.
God works in the waiting. You can trust him, even when it’s been two whole years.
For your deep trust in God,
© John Rinehart 2026