Psalm 27:14 teaches that waiting on the Lord means actively trusting God's timing while maintaining courage and strength, not passive resignation. David calls believers to deliberately place their confidence in God's faithfulness during uncertainty, knowing that those who wait expectantly will receive renewed strength and see God's goodness prevail.
"Wait on the Lord: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the Lord." (Psalm 27:14, KJV)
This verse sits at the end of one of David's most powerful psalms, and it contains a command that goes against everything our culture teaches us. We live in a world where waiting feels like weakness, where patience seems passive, and where delay looks like defeat.
But David—a man who spent years running from King Saul, hiding in caves, fighting battles, and wrestling with his own failures—understood something profound about waiting on God. He wasn't talking about sitting around doing nothing while life passes you by. He was talking about something far more active, far more demanding, and far more transformative.
So what does "wait on the Lord" actually mean? And why does David connect waiting with courage and strength? To answer these questions, we need to understand who wrote this psalm, what was happening in his life, and what the original Hebrew words actually communicate.
Who Wrote Psalm 27 and What Was Happening?
Psalm 27 is attributed to David, the shepherd boy who became Israel's greatest king. But David didn't write this psalm from a throne room while everything was going well. The language and themes throughout Psalm 27 suggest David wrote this during a time of serious danger and opposition.
Look at how the psalm opens: "The Lord is my light and my salvation—whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life—of whom shall I be afraid?" (Psalm 27:1). Right away, David is talking about fear, enemies, and needing protection. This isn't the writing of someone enjoying a peaceful season.
As you read through the psalm, David mentions enemies who want to devour him, false witnesses rising against him, and people seeking his life. He talks about his father and mother forsaking him. He describes adversaries and foes surrounding him. This is a man under serious threat, facing real danger, and dealing with intense pressure.
Many Bible scholars believe David may have written this psalm during one of several difficult periods in his life—possibly when he was fleeing from King Saul, who spent years hunting him down trying to kill him. Or perhaps during Absalom's rebellion, when David's own son turned against him and tried to steal his kingdom, forcing David to flee Jerusalem.
The exact timing doesn't matter as much as recognizing this truth: David wrote Psalm 27:14 from a place of genuine struggle. He wasn't giving theoretical advice from a comfortable distance. He was speaking from lived experience, from the messy middle of uncertainty, from that brutal space between promise and fulfillment.
And that's precisely what makes verse 14 so powerful. After pouring out his heart about dangers and enemies, after declaring God's faithfulness, after expressing both confidence and vulnerability, David ends with this command to himself and to us: "Wait on the Lord."
What Does "Wait" Actually Mean in Hebrew?
Here's where we need to dig into the original language, because the English word "wait" doesn't capture the full meaning of what David is saying.
The Hebrew word used here is "qavah" (pronounced kah-VAH). And qavah doesn't mean sitting around passively hoping something good might happen eventually. That's not biblical waiting.
Qavah means to wait with expectation, to look for eagerly, to hope with confident anticipation. It carries the idea of binding yourself to something, like a rope that's twisted together for strength. Some translations render this word as "hope" or "expect" because it communicates active trust, not passive resignation.
When David says "wait on the Lord," he's not saying, "Just sit there and do nothing while life falls apart around you." He's saying, "Actively place your hope in God. Deliberately position yourself in expectation of His intervention. Consciously choose to trust His timing rather than forcing your own agenda."
Think about it like this: When you're waiting for someone you love at an airport, you don't just stand there staring at the floor with no emotion. You watch the gate. You check the arrivals board. You position yourself where you can see them the moment they appear. Your waiting is active, engaged, expectant. That's qavah.
The prophet Isaiah uses this same word in one of the Bible's most famous passages about waiting: "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).
Notice what happens to those who wait on the Lord—they don't become weaker. They become stronger. Their strength is renewed. They soar, they run, they walk without fainting. Biblical waiting produces strength, not weakness.
Why Does David Connect Waiting with Courage?
Now here's where Psalm 27:14 gets really interesting. David doesn't just say "wait on the Lord" and leave it at that. He adds: "be of good courage."
Why would David connect waiting with courage? Because true waiting requires tremendous bravery.
Think about what was happening in David's life. He had enemies surrounding him. He had people plotting against him. He had immediate dangers threatening him. And in that moment, every natural instinct in his body was probably screaming at him to do something—to take control, to force a solution, to fight back in his own strength, to run away, to manipulate circumstances, to protect himself.
But instead, David chose to wait on God. And that choice required massive courage.
Waiting on God means:
Trusting His timing when you can't see the outcome
Believing His promises when circumstances suggest otherwise
Refusing to compromise your integrity even when it would solve your problem faster
Staying faithful when running away would be easier
Keeping your heart soft when bitterness would feel justified
Maintaining hope when despair seems more realistic
None of that is passive. None of that is weak. All of that requires courage.
The Hebrew phrase "be of good courage" is "chazaq," which means to be strong, to be resolute, to be determined, to fasten upon something. It's a call to inner strength and fortitude. David is essentially saying, "Steel yourself. Strengthen your resolve. Don't give up. Don't give in. Don't quit."
This is a battle cry for the soul.
David knew from experience that the hardest moments in the waiting season are when you're tempted to abandon trust and take matters into your own hands. He'd been there. He'd faced those temptations. And he knew that waiting on God with courage meant fighting against fear, doubt, and the desperate need to control outcomes.
The Promise: "He Shall Strengthen Thine Heart"
Right in the middle of this command to wait with courage, David includes a promise: "and he shall strengthen thine heart."
This is crucial. David isn't just telling you to be strong in your own power. He's telling you that as you wait on God with courage, God Himself will strengthen you from the inside out.
The heart in Hebrew thought represents the center of your being—your mind, will, emotions, and spirit. When David says God will strengthen your heart, he means God will fortify your inner person. He'll give you the resilience you need. He'll provide the endurance required. He'll supply the hope that keeps you going.
You can't manufacture that strength yourself. You can't will yourself into courage when everything around you is falling apart. But when you position yourself in expectation of God, when you deliberately choose to wait on Him rather than relying on yourself, He meets you there with supernatural strength.
This is why David repeats the command at the end of verse 14: "wait, I say, on the Lord." He's emphasizing it, driving it home, making sure you don't miss it. The repetition shows how important this is. David is essentially saying, "I'm not kidding about this. I'm not just giving you a nice religious platitude. I'm telling you from the depths of my experience: wait on the Lord. Really do it. Actually trust Him."
What Waiting on the Lord Looks Like Practically
So how do you actually wait on the Lord in your everyday life? What does this look like when you're facing real problems with real deadlines and real consequences?
First, waiting on the Lord means bringing your situation to God in honest prayer. David models this throughout Psalm 27. He doesn't pretend everything is fine. He tells God exactly what he's facing: "When evildoers assail me to eat up my flesh, my adversaries and foes, it is they who stumble and fall" (Psalm 27:2). He's honest about the danger, but he places his trust in God's protection rather than his own schemes.
Second, waiting on the Lord means continuing to seek Him even when He seems silent. David writes, "You have said, 'Seek my face.' My heart says to you, 'Your face, Lord, do I seek'" (Psalm 27:8). Waiting isn't about ignoring God while you sit around hoping things improve. It's about pressing into relationship with Him, seeking His presence, staying connected to Him even when you don't have answers yet.
Third, waiting on the Lord means refusing to use ungodly methods to solve your problems. When David was running from King Saul, he had multiple opportunities to kill Saul and end his suffering immediately. But David refused. He wouldn't strike down God's anointed king, even though Saul was trying to kill him. David chose to wait for God's timing rather than forcing his own solution through violence. That's what waiting with courage looks like.
Fourth, waiting on the Lord means doing what you know to do while trusting God with what you can't control. Waiting doesn't mean becoming passive or irresponsible. When David was fleeing from Saul, he didn't just sit in a field hoping Saul would change his mind. He gathered loyal men, he moved to safe locations, he made wise decisions. But he didn't try to seize the throne through his own power. He acted responsibly while trusting God for the outcome.
Fifth, waiting on the Lord means reminding yourself of God's character and past faithfulness. David does this throughout Psalm 27. He recalls that God is his light, his salvation, his stronghold. He remembers God's faithfulness. He anchors his hope in who God is, not just in what he wants God to do. When you're in a waiting season, rehearsing God's character and remembering His past faithfulness gives you courage to keep trusting Him.
What Waiting on the Lord Is NOT
We need to be clear about what biblical waiting doesn't mean, because there are a lot of misconceptions that lead people into passivity or false guilt.
Waiting on the Lord does NOT mean:
Ignoring wisdom and practical steps you can take
Refusing to work hard while expecting God to do everything
Staying in abusive or dangerous situations without seeking help
Avoiding difficult conversations or necessary confrontations
Being lazy and calling it faith
Refusing medical treatment and calling it trust
Ignoring responsibilities and calling it surrender
God gave you a mind to use, hands to work with, and wisdom to apply. Waiting on Him means doing what you can while trusting Him with what you can't. It means acting in faith, not presuming on God's grace by being irresponsible.
Some people confuse waiting on God with testing God. They refuse to do what they know to do, and then they blame God when things don't work out. That's not faith—that's foolishness.
Biblical waiting means you pray, you seek God's wisdom, you take the steps He shows you, you work diligently, and you trust Him with the timing and the outcome. You don't force doors open that God has closed, but you don't sit paralyzed in fear when God is clearly leading you forward.
Why Waiting Is So Hard for Us
If we're honest, waiting on the Lord is one of the hardest commands in all of Scripture. Why? Because waiting requires giving up control, and we hate giving up control.
We want to see the full plan before we commit. We want guarantees before we step out in faith. We want to know exactly when our prayer will be answered before we decide to keep trusting. We want to manage the timeline, orchestrate the outcome, and ensure everything works according to our preferences.
But God rarely works that way. More often, He calls us to take the next step without showing us the full staircase. He asks us to trust His goodness without explaining His methods. He invites us to rest in His timing without revealing His schedule.
And that's where courage comes in. Courage to trust when you can't trace. Courage to believe when you can't see. Courage to hope when circumstances suggest hopelessness.
David understood this. He'd spent years in caves waiting for the throne God promised him. He'd watched Saul continue as king even though Samuel had already anointed David as the next king. He'd experienced delay after delay after delay. But through all of it, David learned that God's timing is perfect, even when it's painful.
The Connection to Psalm 27:13
You can't fully understand verse 14 without reading verse 13, which comes right before it. David writes: "I believe that I shall look upon the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living."
This is David's declaration of faith. He's saying, "I'm convinced I'm going to see God's goodness before I die. I'm not going to miss out on what God has for me. I will see His faithfulness break through."
That's the faith that fuels the courage to wait. David isn't waiting with a vague, uncertain hope that maybe possibly God might do something good someday. He's waiting with confident expectation that God absolutely will fulfill His promises.
And then, right after declaring his faith, David gives himself a command: "Wait on the Lord." He's preaching to his own soul. He's reminding himself to keep trusting, to maintain courage, to stay positioned in expectation.
We all need to do this. We need to preach to ourselves when our emotions are screaming fear. We need to command our souls to wait on the Lord when everything in us wants to quit or compromise or force our own solution.
How This Verse Applies to Your Life Today
Maybe you're waiting for God to heal a relationship that feels beyond repair. Maybe you're waiting for a job opportunity that hasn't materialized yet. Maybe you're waiting for physical healing that hasn't come. Maybe you're waiting for a prodigal child to come home. Maybe you're waiting for financial breakthrough. Maybe you're waiting for direction about a major life decision.
Whatever you're waiting for, Psalm 27:14 speaks directly to your situation. God is calling you to wait on Him with courage. He's calling you to actively trust His timing. He's calling you to maintain hope even when circumstances suggest hopelessness.
And here's the promise: as you wait on Him, He will strengthen your heart. You won't do this in your own power. His strength will sustain you. His presence will carry you. His faithfulness will prove true.
Waiting on the Lord doesn't mean your circumstances will change on your timeline. David didn't become king the moment Samuel anointed him. Joseph didn't get released from prison the moment he interpreted the cupbearer's dream. The Israelites didn't enter the promised land the moment God promised it to them.
But in every case, God's timing proved perfect. His delays had purpose. His waiting periods produced character, faith, and deeper dependence on Him.
The same is true for you. What you're waiting for right now is developing something in you that couldn't be developed any other way. The waiting season is not wasted time—it's where God does some of His deepest work in your heart.
A Final Word of Encouragement
If you're in a waiting season right now, don't despise it. Don't wish it away. Don't resent it. Embrace it as the place where God is strengthening your heart, deepening your faith, and preparing you for what's next.
Waiting on the Lord is not passive resignation to whatever happens. It's active trust in a God who sees what you don't see, knows what you don't know, and works in ways you can't imagine.
So take courage. Be strong. Keep your hope anchored in God's character and promises. Don't give up just because the answer hasn't come yet. Don't compromise your integrity to force a breakthrough. Don't abandon faith when the journey gets difficult.
Wait on the Lord. And as you wait, watch Him strengthen your heart, renew your hope, and prove Himself faithful once again.
Because the God who called you to wait is the same God who promises to show up. And His timing is always perfect.
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