I don’t think I’ve ever met someone who enjoys waiting. In fact, if you’re reading this and you actually like to wait, please be my friend, and teach me your ways.

I personally hate waiting. It’s uncomfortable, confusing, aggravating and it often seems pointless at the time. It doesn’t matter if it’s something as simple as waiting for coffee in the Starbucks drive-thru or something as important as marriage, waiting sucks.

But not too long ago, I had a huge perspective change on patience thanks to one of my friends. Her name is Noelle, and she’s one of the coolest, trendiest and artsiest (that’s a word right?) people you’ll ever meet. Being the hipster that she is, one of her favorite things to do in her spare time is paint. Every time she created a new piece, she would bring it to work and show it to me. So one day, she brought in this one particular painting. To this day it is my favorite thing she’s ever painted.

The page is covered in pretty oranges, pinks and yellows, mimicking a summer sunset. And on top of all the colors, she quotes part of Ecclesiastes 3:11, which says:

"He makes everything beautiful in its own time."

As beautiful as this painting turned out to be, the story behind it is what struck me the most.

When Noelle first started to paint this piece, she didn’t like it. It wasn’t turning out how she wanted it to look. It was taking longer to finish than she expected. In the midst of painting it, her hand started cramping. She became so frustrated that she got up and walked away. At once point, she even contemplated throwing it in the trash and giving up. Despite her struggles, she came back to the piece an hour later and finished it.

After that, she sat there thinking about how creating this painting gave her such an accurate picture of the process of waiting.

Sometimes your life may not look exactly like you thought it would. Maybe certain things take longer than you expected them to. Maybe you have to endure some painful circumstances along the way. Thankfully, there is a God who promises to make everything beautiful in its time. He never promises that life will be a breeze, that patience will be easy to come by and he never promises that we will get exactly what we ask Him for. However, he does promise to work all things together for our good and His glory (Romans 8:28).

I had the honor of telling this story at Noelle’s rehearsal dinner a few months ago. So much of how she met her husband coincided with this lesson she learned from her painting just a few months prior. It was the coolest thing to be able to tie the two stories together.

So what about you? Is waiting difficult for you? Is it painful? Time consuming? Frustrating? Trust me, I get it. However, I want to encourage you. Next time you get annoyed with waiting, think about Noelle. Think about her painting, and think about Ecclesiastes 3:11. Because while I can’t guarantee that you’ll get everything you’re waiting on, I can promise that His promise is something worth waiting for.