The late great theologian Tom Petty once said, “The waiting is the hardest part.” Truer words were never spoken.
We are a people on the move, on screens, and a tight schedule. Waiting is counterintuitive and difficult. We need to move on to the next thing, as every young person hammered with questions by adults knows: “Where are you going to college?” “What’s your major?” “What are you going to do for a living?” “Are there any significant others in your life?” When are you going to get married?” “When are you going to have babies?” We’re preconditioned not to live in the moment, not to wait to see what this moment has for us now, but to look ahead, to race forward to the next thing.
Yet, as author A.J. Sherrill tells us, active waiting, waiting as we pray, love, work and live, is the life and call of the church. We are reborn to be a people of waiting. The older I get, and the more death, loss, and pain I see unfolding around me, the more world-weary I become. I become more aware that I’m waiting- waiting for a time when the Lord returns to make all things new.
Our great heroes in Scripture became experts in waiting upon the Lord, whether they wanted to or not. Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel, Hannah, and Elizabeth, to name only a few, waited years for the Lord before he finally answered their prayers. While in the reading, only sentences or paragraphs exist between the promises of God and their fulfillment in the actual lives of these people, years and decades of long, often painful, and shameful waiting were their reality.
Even considering only these scriptural examples, the women named above, in the collectivist cultures in which they lived, not having children wasn’t a choice, it was a curse from God. Being barren was a shameful thing, a sign before the community that you had committed grievous sin or were suffering God’s punishment. This was not a sad effect of living in a Genesis 3 world; this was your fault. So, you faced a greater or lesser degree of ostracism and separation from the people around you, people you needed to help you make it in the world.
Sarah had been promised a child and had waited years to see that promise fulfilled. The others had never had such a promise. They cried out to God for years, waiting without indication that God heard their pleading. All of them were married, and their husbands endured the same shame, the same pain.
This struck me the other day as I read Luke 1:8-23, the story of Zechariah in the Temple receiving the vision of John the Baptist’s birth. Zechariah is in the Holy Place, just outside the Holy of Holies, the one place in the world where God is most present. He is burning incense, which symbolizes the people’s prayers being offered to God. His division of priests is assigned to the Temple for this period, and his lot to serve has been drawn. This may be the only time he will ever have this opportunity to serve this close to the holiest place in the holiest city in the holiest country on earth.
An angel of the Lord shows up and announces to Zechariah that his decades-long prayers for a son have been answered. What’s more, this son will be a great prophet like Elijah, calling people to the coming of the Lord. This is simply amazing!
And how does Zechariah respond? We’re told he’s “troubled and afraid” and he asks, “How shall I know this? For I am an old man, and my wife is advanced in years.” Zechariah comes to serve the Lord in the place of his presence, and yet he never actually expects God to show up! He’s surprised, scared, and a little doubtful and ticked off when he does! He certainly doesn’t expect his prayers to be answered. Do we find his attitude a little shocking?
Maybe not so much. How long have you been praying for that thing you really want? I’m not talking about the new car or iPhone you’ve got your eye on, but something that you are sure is in God’s will. Maybe a child or a husband or wife of your own? Maybe for God to heal you or the one you love? Maybe for God to return that one you love and who has strayed away from him back to y’all? Maybe for that family member or friend who has never known Jesus actually to come to him?
Yet, you’re still waiting. You may have been waiting for years, decades even. You are grieving for certain by now. You may be explaining to yourself why God hasn’t answered your prayers, maybe trying to do a little image management for God to maintain your faith and hope?
That’s probably what Zechariah felt. He was probably tired of praying after decades of his wife’s weeping in her shame and pain, after being the priest that people talked about behind his back, after feeling every excruciating day of the muted God. He might have even stopped praying the prayers, or at least not as regularly. According to the angel, at least, he no longer believed.
So, God gave him a great gift. He made Zechariah mute, forcing him into silence. The priest, who was supposed to bless the people after emerging from the Temple, could now only testify miraculously and silently to an encounter with the living God. This was no punishment but a loving, gentle discipline from his Father’s hand. Forced into silence, Zechariah had nine months to watch God’s blessing grow, to watch his wife fill with joy, to contemplate all that God had done to him and for him in those decades of God’s silence, to listen to God’s voice work on his heart, to wait…
I knew I wanted to be a lawyer since I was nine. My great-grandfather, grandfather, and stepfather were all lawyers. I dreamed of arguing cases before juries in wood-paneled courtrooms. I worked for it, studied for it, and got a great job in a law firm.
I knew I had made a big mistake about six months into it. I enjoyed being in the courtroom, but that was not what lawyering was. I really didn’t like almost everything else about it, except the people I worked with. Soon after that, I began developing a knot in my stomach every Sunday night before beginning the work week.
And so, less than a year into it, I began praying for God to give me another opportunity to serve him. I prayed that prayer for ten more years. Ten years of a knot in my stomach before going to work, of doing my work as unto the Lord, and having some success, but being pretty miserable the entire time. Ten. Years. Then, one day, the then-executive pastor of Grace called and asked if I’d be interested in considering serving as the school’s development director. And everything changed.
I realize now what Zechariah may have seen during those nine muted months. The waiting taught me to be more patient and resilient, it taught me that my timing really isn’t that important in the weight of eternity but that God’s timing is everything. I don’t know, but he knows, and pressing through the pain taught me that I can press through anything (making COVID and five strategic plans’ worth of organizational change and the natural resistance that comes with it a lot easier, or at least doable).
The waiting taught me to be more faithful. It taught me to appreciate this precious gift I had been given, this school and these people, this fantastic opportunity to live with, love, and serve you all for nearly 25 years. When I had other opportunities, bigger jobs in bigger cities, it made me realize that this was my gift, this was my place, and these were my people. The waiting gave me a deeper appreciation for the fulfillment of God’s promises when they finally came. And, they do come.
Finally, the waiting made me more trusting in the Lord to provide what we need when we need it in the muddled middle of life. It taught me to play “the long game,” whether we’re talking about a facility we need, an initiative we’ve planned, or, most importantly, God’s work in the heart of a child–really, any aspect of our school or in my own development as a leader. God is at work, often most when and where we don’t see it, behind the scenes, maybe for decades, until he miraculously appears and makes the pain go away–leaving deep things of life behind.
This is the sometimes vicious, grievous beauty in waiting. Tish Harrison Warren says “Advent is the practice of waiting.” Waiting is hard because we want to rush ahead to “the good stuff, ” the celebrations, the rejoicing. Yet, in many ways, the good stuff is in the waiting.
Can we just slow down and wait a moment before we get to Christmas? Can we be in the stillness and silence of God’s presence, even in the pain of yearning and need of what has not yet come, and wait? Only then can you rejoice that he has come to meet your every need, even those you don’t yet see coming.
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