Waiting...

We spend a great deal of our lives waiting. When we're children we wait to be teenagers. When we're teenagers we wait to be grown ups. When we're grown up, we wait to be married. Then when we're married we to have children. Then when we have children we wait for them to move on. Then we wait to retire so we can do all the things we've been waiting to do all our lives.

On another level we wait in traffic, for doctors, for buses, for test results, for food to cook, and for our computer to function faster. We also wait for dreams to come about. We even wait for death. Stop to think about the waiting that you do in your life.

With so much of our lives taken up with waiting, the big question is, WHAT GOOD IS THERE IN WAITING?

Waiting calms me down. If I'm excited, waiting allows me to get another perspective. My emotions cool. I tend to see things with a better perspective. Waiting also heightens my by dependence on God. Waiting is a defenseless state. I need help. I can turn to God.

Jesus knew about waiting. Imagine, he waited 30 years in Nazareth before he began his public ministry. Thirty years. That's a long time for the Son of God to wait before he got around to doing his work. I think that it's good to look at Jesus' waiting to get some clarity on how we should deal with waiting.

Jesus moved from waiting to action through his cousin John. John the Baptist was a striking person. He had given up everything that others might consider important, to surrender to his total dedication to God. Food, cloths, housing, status, money were all put on an insignificant level. He wanted no temporal distractions to take him away from his love for God.

His life style touched the hearts of many people. His life called people to put God in a more significant place in their lives. Jesus heard about his cousin and traveled the 90 miles from Nazareth to where the Jordan flowed into the Dead Sea. As Jesus watched and listened to Jesus, he knew that his time of waiting was completed. He needed to begin his active ministry.

John was asking people to symbolize their desire to change by stepping into the water of the river and then submerge. The act was similar to entering in to the grave. It was a symbolic act of dying to one's old self to then come out of the water to a new life.

Jesus took the challenge. He went into the water. He went into the grave. When he came out, the Holy Spirit came on him and the voice of his Father proclaimed words of endorsement. Jesus knew that his time of waiting was over.

But, interestingly, there was more waiting. The Spirit drove Jesus into the desert where he waited another 40 days. Ah, more waiting. Finally he began his work of proclaiming repentance and the nearness of the Kingdom of God .

We should learn from the waiting and the call of Jesus. Yes, we wait. Like Jesus we should search for the call from waiting. We should listen for the call of a person in our lives who'll beckon us to a change, to action. The person might be a relative, a friend, an enemy or even a stranger. The call might come through a work of art: a painting, a play, a movie a dance. God might call us through a sickness or a lose or a failure.

Are we willing to listen, to respond, to act? That's the big question. May we learn from Christ. May we be patient in our waiting. May we courageously listen to God's call when it comes and move to the important work the Lord has asked us to do.