First Baptist Church Of Memphis

Mark Wheeler writes: “The waiting room, a land where time seemingly stands still. It is a place where life is put on hold. In my doctor’s office, it feels like hours have passed, and yet when I look at my watch, it’s been only 20 minutes. When we are in the waiting room, it seems as if progress has come to a screeching halt.”
That’s about right, now isn’t it?  Waiting can be an exhausting experience.  Now there’s no perfectly physiological reason to claim this.  You don’t expend many calories when you are waiting.  Maybe jogging in place waiting to cross a street, but otherwise, it tends to be a rather sedentary affair.
But it is exhausting, draining, anything but energizing.   Well, scripture presents waiting in a different light.   Isaiah 40:31 is probably the most popular text, and it states, “They that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength.”  Renew their strength?  Be energized from waiting?  Maybe herein lies a secret, an important discovery for us given the fact that Advent is, after all, a season of waiting.
The Biblical concept here is idea of anticipation, expectation.  Ah, here are words that perk us up.  Waiting, in the Biblical sense, is far more than a draining waste of time.  It’s a perspective on life that something significant is about to happen, is just around the corner.
Think of a surprise birthday party.   You get there early and you discuss and take glee in your secrecy.   Then it gets close to time and everyone gets stationed, but not quite hidden.  Then you hear the car pull up in the driveway, and you hide in nervous anticipation.  Then the moment arrives and you yell, “Surprise.”  But no time, in the entire experience, is more energized than that moment right before the guest of honor walks in.
That’s what the Bible speaks of when it says to wait.  Its not a passive activity, but an active one.  Ever seeking, ever looking, because just around this corner, and every corner, God, the true guest of honor, is there.
The New English Bible has a great rendering of Luke 3:15.  It says, “The people were on the tiptoe of expectation, all wondering about John, whether perhaps he was the Messiah…”  Well, as we all know, they had it wrong.  But that attitude is exactly what I think the Bible has in mind when it tells us to wait.  Waiting is penultimate.  True.  But it’s alert, ever seeking.  For Jesus to come back.  Yes, but also for Jesus to come to us even today—in friends, nature, books, service, the least of these.
So this Advent, engage in waiting, seeking, searching for not only the Jesus who came, and the Jesus who is coming, but the Jesus that is among us even now.  Those who seek…find.
Grace,
David