SLOW DOWN AND WAIT
First Sunday of Advent, December 2, 2007
Second Baptist Church
Dr. Stephen D. Jones, preaching
Text: Isaiah 30:18-20
Perhaps it’s a
“guy-thing,” I’m not sure. But when you put me behind the steering wheel of a
car, I have one purpose in mind: to get there. My patience is non-existent. The
other day Jo Koehler and I were in my car together. And we were sitting at an
intersection in the left-turn lane. We were the third car back. The light turned
green and there was no on-coming traffic. We sat there and the front car did not
move. Finally, I tapped my horn for a little moral encouragement to the front
car to make the left turn. Jo said that she thought for a moment and then
decided she would treat me like she would George and said, “The traffic sign
says, ‘No left turn except on arrow.” Oh.
Hesitant drivers
drive me crazy! And if I’m late or running behind, whatever normal patience that
I possess is completely gone. I suppose I could use these moments for prayer:
“God, get rid of all these other cars in my way and let me tell you what to do
with these red lights!”
To my credit, I can
handle empty time better than when I was a young adult. I can handle quiet,
now. And silence.
But waiting is
something other than silence, isn’t it? Waiting is something different than
quiet?
Is there anyone
who enjoys waiting? Is there anyone who walks into the bank and sees a long line
waiting for a teller and feels a deep sense of relief? Or what about lines in
the grocery store, backed up behind three customers who seem to be shopping for
a small army? Can you imagine anyone saying, “Oh, I just love to wait!” What’s
your favorite past-time, Sally? “Waiting…can’t beat it! There’s nothing I would
rather do. Just sort of hate it when the wait is over!”
Ask a small child
waiting for her birthday if she enjoys the wait? Ask someone waiting for the
results from a medical test? Ask a parent waiting for the arrival home of their
grown children? Ask a mother waiting for the birth of her child? Ask someone
looking for a job?
It’s agony, pure
agony. We’re not good at waiting!
You’ll get your
raise in time. Just wait.
Your promotion is
in the pipeline. Just hold on.
You’ll eventually
graduate. Be patient.
You’ll get your
driver’s license soon enough. Hang in there.
You’ll find the
perfect partner, that wonderful mate. Just give it time.
I didn’t have time
to grade your final exam. You’ll know soon enough.
One of the reasons
that we are so lousy at waiting is because time is more precious to us than
anything else. We are all given the same amount of time in each day and once
it’s spent, you can’t get it back. Bill Gates has no more time than you or
me. And if you are trying to get ahead of me, then you’ll have to use your 24
hours better than I use my 24 hours.
Speed is everything
in today’s society. Who wants to wait more than 30 seconds for fast food? I’m
sure you’ve noticed that when you call most commercial numbers these days you no
longer talk to a human being. You interact with recorded messages. They give you
six selections, and if none of those selections are exactly what you want, you
have to choose anyway. Sometimes, I try to circumvent these messages by hitting
“zero” and occasionally that gets you to an operator. But sometimes, if you hit
zero or any other number not offered, it sends you back to the first menu and
you get to start all over again. Or what about those service calls when the
recorded message tells you, “I’m sorry, all our agents are serving other
customers. Please don’t hang up. Your estimated wait time is five minutes.” And
then you get to listen to recorded messages trying to sell you their products
when the purpose of your phone call is to tell them that their product doesn’t
work! And then, when you finally get to talk to an operator, you learn that you
have called the wrong number and they will have to connect you with the correct
office, when you get to wait all over again! By the time Cynthia comes on the
line your hostility level is through the roof! What little civility you had at
the beginning is completely gone!
Wait? Who’s got
time for it? This better be good, whatever it is I am waiting for.
Well, what are you
waiting for? When we use that expression, we usually mean, “Stop waiting! Go for
it! Get with it! What are you waiting for?”
But this morning, I
don’t mean it that way. I mean it an entirely different way: What are you
waiting for? You can’t possibly have everything you want. You likely don’t need
more stuff. What do you buy a person like me for Christmas?
I’m not talking
about stuff. I’ve never known anyone who had everything in their life in the
right place at the right moment. All their relationships. All their desires. All
their accomplishments. All their tasks and errands. Everything
untangled. Everything uncomplicated. Every question answered. Every need
addressed. Every wrong righted. Every goal attained. Every emptiness filled.
Well, what are you
waiting for? If something could come together for you, something that would make
a difference in your life, what would it be? Mr. Right? The perfect job? The
most exciting new friend? Fame? Fortune? Recognition? The Jackpot? Next Summer’s
vacation? What are you waiting for?
Bev Apple has been
waiting two years for a kidney transplant. And sometimes she was told that she
might not be a good candidate. She had to endure a lot during that time of
waiting. And then, a week ago Wednesday, the moment finally came and her waiting
was over.
A few years ago, I
had a church member who turned 100 and the next year she said to me, “Steve,
I’ve lived a good life. I’ve done all I want to do. I said all I’ve needed to
say. I’ve seen all I want to see. Why am I still here? What am I waiting for?
What are you
waiting for?
It is peculiar, but
there isn’t much in life that is truly valuable that is also instantaneous. Most
of the good things in life can’t be ordered up like fast-food. There’s no
drive-through for visions, dreams, possibilities, solutions, answers. Life’s
most cherished things take time. They require waiting.
Try teaching. That
magic moment when something is learned. Havighurst first coined the term, “the
teachable moment.” No teacher can control that. It’s not instantaneous. You
learn from someone when you trust them. The teacher keeps trying until she
connects with you. Prior to that, the teacher waits for that moment.
Try falling in
love. Have you tried to fall in love? Tried to force it? Or tried to get someone
to fall in love with you? I sat across the table recently from an attractive
woman who devoted her career as a public educator and didn’t marry until well
into her senior retirement years. Do you wait for something like that to
happen? You certainly can’t put your life on hold waiting, can you?
This is where we
live most of the time: in the meantime. This isn’t the way we want it to be, it
isn’t the way it could be, and so, in the meantime, we wait. Actually, we don’t
wait. We try to force our way through, push for results, drive hard for
outcomes. And when all else fails, we wait.
Advent is the
church’s season for waiting. And if there is an art to it, most of us don’t get
it. We haven’t a clue. This is one thing we don’t know how to do. Patience seems
in short supply in our high-speed society.
The best things in
life take time. The best things in life come in their own time. The best dreams
in life take time to unfold. The best outcomes take time.
The church must be
crazy to think of this time of the year as a season of waiting! Schedules are
rarely more hectic than in this holiday season. There’s shopping to do, extra
concerts and parties to attend, a house to decorate, special holiday foods to
prepare, Christmas cards to send, holiday arrangements that require our
attention. Perhaps the church should re-organize itself and leave the waiting
until January when we might have more time for it. But the truth of it is that
we won’t do any better waiting in January.
I can tell you
this: I predict that you will be disappointed on Christmas morning if you don’t
take some time for waiting during advent. If you rush right on through, you’ll
miss something. You’ll cross everything off your “to do” list, you’ll wrap every
present, clean every room, attend every event, and it won’t be enough. An
emptiness may overtake you. I’m not suggesting that you cancel Christmas. I am
suggesting that you carve out some moments for simple waiting.
What is this act of
waiting, anyway? Waiting is “holding onto something” that can-be but
isn’t-yet. Waiting is gentle. Gentle time. Can you give yourself some gentle
time?
There’s a lot of
“doing” in our lives. “Waiting” is a counter-balance. Waiting pulls in the
opposite direction of doing. Doing means that I am trying to take control,
regain power, manipulate outcomes. Waiting means that this is beyond my
control. I can’t simply make this happen. It isn’t just up to me
That’s why
scripture offers us this wonderful expression, “Wait upon the Lord.” It isn’t up
to me. It’s beyond my control. I can’t make this happen.
The Psalmist said,
“Make me to know your ways, O Lord; teach me your paths. Lead me in your truth…,
for you are the God of my salvation; for you I wait all day long” (Psalm
25:4-5). Another Psalm says, “Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart
take courage; wait for the Lord!” (27:14). It does take strength to wait,
doesn’t it? Twenty-one times the Psalmists implore us to wait upon the
Lord. Isaiah says, “They who wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength…”
(40:31a
Isaiah offers an
even deeper insight in our text for today, “Therefore, the Lord waits to be
gracious to you…” Why doesn’t God just forge ahead? Break in? Interrupt? Force
a better way upon us? Push us onto the right path? Not allow anything or anyone
to stand in God’s way
Is God waiting for
you? Is God waiting for you to become receptive? Waiting for you to
listen? Waiting for you to slow down, to break down, to give up, to run out of
steam, to stop? Is God waiting for you and me to wait?
And in that season,
when God is waiting, and we are waiting, could that not be an opportune time? A
moment pregnant with possibility?
You already know the outcome to this story. I don’t have to tell you
how it ends. We’ll light all four candles in the advent wreath and on Christmas
Eve we’ll return here to light the Christ Candle. This isn’t a new story. It
won’t have a different ending. “In those days a decree went out from Caesar
Augustus that all the world should be taxed…” You know this story. Joseph, Mary,
Bethlehem, no room at the inn, shepherds, wise sages, Jesus’ birth, swaddling
clothes.
We’re not waiting
on this, are we? Could there be anyone in St. Louis who doesn’t know this
story? So, what are we waiting on here?
God has a birthing
word to whisper in our ears. God has a nativity in mind for you and for me, as
if we have never met a shepherd, never seen the stable, never encountered an
angel, never followed a star, never been to Bethlehem, and never stumbled upon
the baby Jesus.
Waiting is that
gentle time when you “hold onto something” that can-be but isn’t-yet.
Slow down and
wait. Slow down and wait.
Blessed are those
who wait upon the Lord. Blessed are those who slow down and wait. Amen.
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