In our prayer lives, there are prayer requests that come and go. It might be a situation at work, a mild cold or flu, or a hard conversation that needs to be had. They can be difficult situations, but they often will be resolved rather quickly.
Then there are those prayer requests that look like they are going to be there for months or even years.
Whether it’s something that we have no control over or such a huge struggle that it will take so much time to resolve, we must be patient in the waiting period while we pray our way through it.
Turning to prayer during these hard times is the best way to handle these struggles. These examples of a prayer for patience while waiting are here to help you through the difficult times that feel like a testing of your faith.
Don’t miss the free download of printable Bible verse cards at the end of this article.
Prayer for Patience While Waiting: 5 Examples to Help You Hope
It can be incredibly difficult to wait for God to answer our prayers. We may have been praying for weeks, months, or years, by ourselves or with groups of people, and just waiting on God to answer the prayer the way we want Him to.
It can also be a struggle as we see God answer the prayers of other people, maybe even in seemingly identical circumstances. If God answered that prayer, why didn’t He answer ours, too?
There are so many reasons that we have to wait on answers to prayer, and why prayer for patience while waiting is a good idea to help us through the waiting.
We may need to grow in trust in God for His timing. God might be strengthening us and our faith as we wait. He may be teaching us how to have peace in difficult times.
Or we might be growing our faith in Him to know what is best for us. We could be in a time where He wants to teach us to be more grateful.
Even if we won’t understand on this side of heaven the way that God is working in this situation, we can trust Him with what we face. Going to Him in prayer is one of the ways we can do this.
It is sometimes tempting to give up on a prayer request we’ve been praying so long, but our God will give His perfect answer in His perfect time.
Look at these examples of prayer for patience while waiting and use them to inspire your own prayers. You can also pray along with these prayers with a sincere heart, especially if you aren’t sure what to pray.
Don’t miss out on the free printable at the end of this post, which includes some prayer points to help you pray while you wait.
Prayer for Trust in God’s Timing
Who are we to dictate the proper time to God to answer our prayers?
We definitely have our own plans for when and how God should answer our prayers. These plans are usually “right now!” and “as requested!”
That isn’t always the best idea. There is an interesting quote from Oscar Wilde that addresses this idea, although in a polytheistic way. “When the gods wish to punish us, they answer our prayers.”
This is not true of our God, but it introduces an interesting hypothetical situation. What if we had everything we had prayed for, given to us on demand instead of at the right time?
Would we be who God wants us to be? Would we be closer to Him? Would God be anything more than a vending machine to us, as we insert a prayer and receive an answer?
One of the ways that prayer helps us is to grow us in our trust of God, and that includes our trust in God’s timing. He is our God of perfect timing (2 Peter 3:8-9), and we must believe that He will do what is for the good of those who love Him (Romans 8:28).
Let’s pray that we will trust God’s timing, that we will have patience as we wait for His appointed time to answer this prayer request according to His perfect will.
Dear God,
Thank You that I can trust You! You know this great burden on my heart, for this prayer request that I have brought to You again and again.
Ecclesiastes 3:11 tells me that You have made everything beautiful in its time. I trust that You, Lord, can redeem this situation according to Your perfect will.
I surrender my timing of this answer to You, that You know everything and have a perfect answer for this situation.
Please renew my patience while I wait for Your answer and help me to be faithful in continuing to pray.
In Jesus’ Name, Amen.
Prayer for Strength and Patience During Hard Times
When we encounter difficult times, we can falter as we try to get by on our own strength.
We think that we should be able to handle situations on our own. Maybe we like that someone tells us that we are so strong. Or we might be proud that we are getting through these hard times by ourselves.
Why do we put ourselves through this? We instead should be looking to the Lord for our strength every single day, not just during difficult situations. If this isn’t currently a habit, today is a good day to start!
This prayer for strength and patience during hard times can help us as we wait for God’s answer for deliverance from this situation for ourselves or for the ones we love.
O God,
Thank You that I can look to You for strength each day. Your Word tells me in Isaiah 40:31 that “those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength.”
I wait for You, O Lord God, and ask You to renew my strength today. As I wait for Your provision for what faces me today, and as I wait for answers to my prayers, I look to You for Your strength, patience, and grace in my life.
Help me to have a loving and patient heart as I walk with You today.
In the precious name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
Prayer for Understanding and Peace While Waiting
What are we struggling with as we go through difficult times? Often, it is to understand our situation, and to find peace with it.
What if we let go of our need to understand the situation? Would it bring us more of God’s peace?
Our understanding is so basic here on earth. We are often just focused on the snippet of life that we can see right now, and can’t account for the intricacies of God’s will as He works not only in our lives but in the lives of others, including future generations to come.
When we have patience about a situation, and are not hurrying to make sense out of every detail, we are trusting God to work it all out for His own perfect will.
Usually, this can help us lay aside some of the anxiety that accompanies trying to understand all the “whys” and “what-ifs” that accompany our daily lives.
This prayer for understanding and peace while waiting helps us surrender our circumstances to the Lord.
O Lord,
I face hard things today, but I trust in You for what is coming my way.
Philippians 4:6-7 reminds me, “In nothing be anxious, but in everything, by prayer and petition with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your thoughts in Christ Jesus.”
I pray for this perfect peace from You, peace that I can’t even understand. Help me to let go of the things that make my heart anxious.
And help me to surrender situations and circumstances to You that I will never understand this side of heaven. You know why they happened; that is enough for me.
Thank You for Your grace in my life!
In Jesus’ Name, Amen.
Prayer for Faith and Patience in God’s Promises
When we pray and don’t immediately see an answer to that prayer, we can start to doubt God.
There are a lot of reasons for unanswered prayers. Sometimes we won’t get to understand them while we live here on earth. But sometimes we aren’t seeing our answers for good reasons that we can understand, although it may take some time.
We may be praying for something that is outside of the will of God because it is sinful. We could be praying for something that He has a different answer for, but we won’t know that for years.
Sometimes we claim that He has promised us something, but it is our own heart that has deceived us.
This is why it is good to pray through these doubts and ask God to give us faith and patience in His true promises. God is true to His Word.
Dear Father God,
As I pray again and again for this challenging situation, You know that I struggle with trusting You for the answer.
In this difficult waiting period, I pray that You would strengthen my faith and patience in You. May I see Your promises fulfilled. May I be like Abraham in Hebrews 6:15, “Thus, having patiently endured, he obtained the promise.”
I put my hope in You, my faithful and wonderful God.
In Jesus’ Name, Amen.
Prayer for Daily Patience and Gratitude
We talk so much about being patient for God’s answer to prayer, but do we consider how patient God is with us in our daily lives?
We are not perfect Christians. Having a personal relationship with Jesus changes our heart, but it doesn’t make us into sinless beings. Instead, God watches us sin again and again, and forgives us again and again as we confess our sins to Him.
God is the perfect model of patience, and we can look to Him to give us that patience. It is a fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22-23), and He can cultivate this practice of patience in us.
We can also let gratitude change our attitude as we get our minds off our problems and onto God’s blessings.
Dear Heavenly Father,
I need to grow in patience as I grow in other areas. I want to be more faithful. I desire to be holier. I pray to be more fruitful. But all of these things mean I need to patiently persevere.
Show me how to be more patient in the present moment. Help me to look to You when I need patience.
James 1:3-4 says, “Knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. Let endurance have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”
I pray that I would let Your perfect work be done in my life according to Your timing and Your will.
Give me a thankful and grateful heart each day, that I could see Your blessings and provisions along the way as I follow You.
In Jesus’ Name, Amen.
Free Bible Verse Printable for Patience While Waiting
These Bible verses are a reminder of the strength and grace we can find in the Lord. He is always faithful! Click through here to download the verses from our Gumroad shop. You can find more free items in our shop by clicking here and scrolling down to “free downloads.”
It can be so difficult to live life in some sort of waiting room, holding off life and happiness until the perfect circumstance is achieved.
That is why praying for patience while waiting is so important. It helps us during prayer time to get our hearts in a better place, where we accept that waiting is part of life, and trust God to take care of those difficult situations according to His perfect will.
With God’s help, we can find His patience and peace as we wait, and grow in our faith in Him.
Our God is a God of Hope! Let us be encouraged in Him to live a patient and faithful life in Him today.
If you liked “Prayer for Patience While Waiting,” you may also like Prayer for Marriage Protection, Prayer for Grandmothers, and Prayers for Feeling Overwhelmed.
