The Spirituality of Waiting Chris Hutton The First Mennonite Church Dec. 13, 2015 We hate waiting. We hate it so much. We hate waiting for the bus to arrive. Waiting in an airport. Waiting for that money to arrive. Waiting for someone late to an appointment. Waiting in drive-thru s. Waiting for meals. Waiting in a hospital s waiting room. Waiting for that sermon to end. When we re doing things, we feel in control. Finally, I m accomplishing something. I m doing something. I m not just sitting around waiting. I have control over determining the outcome of my life, or the outcome of my situation. When we re doing things, we feel valuable. Now I matter. Now I count. I m doing something. I m not just sitting around waiting. What s one of the top questions we ask people, when we meet someone new? What do you do? It s in our doing of things that we become someone. We become what we do. What we do ends up defining our identity. What we do becomes the reason for our existence. I exist because I m doing this. We fear waiting because it makes us feel out of control. If I m not doing anything then something will happen outside of my control. I can t allow that to happen! I have to be in control of my life. We begin to fear what will happen if we don t do anything. We begin to fear what will happen if we wait. It is out of the fear of waiting, that people often take the aggressive, strike-first approach. Shoot first, ask questions later. We make ourselves busy and do things in order to be in control and in order to be valuable to other people. And Christmas is one of the busiest times of the year, isn t it? We have last-minute shopping to do. We have to cook and prepare food for work parties, family parties, church parties. We have to figure out all of the details for Christmas travels. Where are we going for Christmas this year? Who are we hosting at our home for Christmas this year? In and amongst all of that doing, Christmas suddenly becomes one of the most stressful times of the year for us. I liked how Melissa Miller put her anxieties in her recent article in the Canadian Mennonite, Melissa Miller writes that as she scrambles to get everything done, she begins to feel like a Christmas failure.
If I don t do everything, I will have become a failure. When my identity resides in my busyness, I begin to lead a frenetic and anxious life, and it begins to become difficult to trust God. I begin to feel like I am imprisoned. I am tyrannized by the chains of busyness. And yet Advent is a season of waiting. We are told by the church calendar year that in the weeks leading up to Christmas, we must remember how to wait. Just as the world once waited for the birth of a Messiah. Just as the world currently waits for freedom, hope, healing, mercy, and justice. Our children can t wait for Christmas Day. For us too, it is difficult to wait. I d like to read for you a story of some other people who waited around the season of Christ s birth: At that time there was a man in Jerusalem named Simeon. He was righteous and devout and was eagerly waiting for the Messiah to come and rescue Israel. The Holy Spirit was upon him and had revealed to him that he would not die until he had seen the Lord s Messiah. That day the Spirit led him to the Temple. So when Mary and Joseph came to present the baby Jesus to the Lord as the law required, Simeon was there. He took the child in his arms and praised God, saying, Sovereign Lord, now let your servant die in peace, as you have promised. I have seen your salvation, which you have prepared for all people. He is a light to reveal God to the nations, and he is the glory of your people Israel! Jesus parents were amazed at what was being said about him. Then Simeon blessed them, and he said to Mary, the baby s mother, This child is destined to cause many in Israel to fall, but he will be a joy to many others. He has been sent as a sign from God, but many will oppose him. As a result, the deepest thoughts of many hearts will be revealed. And a sword will pierce your very soul. Anna, a prophet, was also there in the Temple. She was the daughter of Phanuel from the tribe of Asher, and she was very old. Her husband died when they had been married only seven years. Then she lived as a widow to the age of eighty-four. She never left the Temple but stayed there day and night, worshiping God with fasting and prayer. She came along just as Simeon was talking with Mary and Joseph, and she began praising God. She talked about the child to everyone who had been waiting expectantly for God to rescue Jerusalem.
When Jesus parents had fulfilled all the requirements of the law of the Lord, they returned home to Nazareth in Galilee. (Luke 2: 25-39, NLT) Henri Nouwen, a Catholic priest who was a famous writer and speaker, once said that waiting is an integral part of Christian spirituality. Waiting plays an important part in our faith. Most people believe that waiting is passive. Waiting is not productive. But Henri suggests that there are actually five parts to waiting: First, waiting is movement. Waiting is not moving from nothing to something. It is moving from something to something. Simeon waits because the Holy Spirit has promised something to him: that he will see the Messiah before he dies. And we have been promised something as well. We have been promised eternal life. We have been promised the fulfillment of all history. We wait for when God will return to make everything right. Next, waiting is Action. Anna does not do nothing as she waits. She fasts and prays. She worships God. She talks to God while she waits. She does not do these things in order to define herself. She does them in order to relate to God. For us as well, God invites us to relate with him as we wait. We don t do these things in order to be someone to God. God says that we are his beloved children. Now sit, and talk awhile while we wait. Be with me as my child while we wait. Be present fully in this moment, not agonizing over the past, or agonizing and worrying about the future. Waiting is Patient. Henri Nouwen says that the impatient person always wants to look somewhere else for something. They are unable to be in the moment, here and now, seeing and recognizing what God is doing in this present moment. Rather than seeing God present with them right in this moment, they agonize over where was God yesterday when I needed him, or will he be there when I go through this in the future? And they miss God right in front of them right now. Can we be patient, and stop worrying in order to see God in front of us right now? Waiting is open-ended. Trying to micro-manage and control every detail of our existence inevitably leads us to frustration, then anxiety, and then depression. Because it can t be done. The waiting person opens him or herself to what God wants to do. The waiting person opens him or herself to infinite possibilities. We open ourselves to listening to God, and seeing what is actually unfolding before us. Rather than anxiously trying to control the story. Henri Nouwen says open-ended waiting is to trust that something will happen to us that is far beyond our imaginings. When the Holy Spirit promised Simeon that he would see the Messiah, could Simeon have ever imagined that not only was he going to see the Messiah, but he was going to hold God himself come to earth in the form
of a newborn child? When Mary and Marth waited for Jesus to come to them after the death of their brother, could they have known that Jesus would raise Lazarus from the dead? In order for waiting to be truly open-ended, it must also be hopeful. Our waiting presides on the promise that hope is coming. We trust that God will shape us and our lives according to his love, and not according to fear. In this way, the promise of hope becomes like a seed that is planted. We can t see every minute detail of its growth. The seed is underground and out of sight for a long time. But we trust and we hope that it will grow into something beautiful. Henri Nouwen says that hope is trusting something will be fulfilled, but fulfilled according to the promises [of God] and not just according to our wishes. Let me read you a story from Henri that he tells about a friend of his: I was invited to visit a friend who was very sick. He was a man about fifty- three years old who had lived a very active, useful, faithful, creative life. Actually, he was a social activist who had cared deeply for people. When he was fifty he found out he had cancer, and the cancer became more and more severe. When I came to him, he said to me, Henri, here I am lying in this bed, and I don t even know how to think about being sick. My whole way of thinking about myself is in terms of action, in terms of doing things for people. My life is valuable because I ve been able to do many things for many people. And suddenly here I am passive and I can t do anything anymore. And he said to me, Help me to think about this situation in a new way. Help me to understand what it means that now all sorts of people are doing things to me over which I have no control. As we talked I realized that he and many others were constantly thinking How much more can I still do? Somehow this man had learned to think about himself as a man who was worth only what he was doing. And so when he got sick his hope seemed to rest on the idea that he might get better and return to what he had been doing. I realized too, that this way of thinking was hopeless because the man had cancer and was going to get worse and worse. He would die soon. If the spirit of this man was dependent on how much he would still be able to do, what did I have to say to him? In the passion and resurrection of Jesus, we see a waiting God. This is to say that Jesus does not accomplish his task, his purpose, or his vocation because of what he does, but rather because of what is done to him. Jesus waits in the garden of Gethsemane for the men to come and arrest him. He waits for the sentence of Pilate to be passed. He waits to be taken out and crucified. He waits to die. And all of that time, he must trust that God s will is done.
After reading, praying and talking, Henri s friend came to realize that after much hard work, he had to wait. He came to see that his vocation as a human being would be fulfilled not just in his actions, but also in his own passion. In his own waiting. If we took a long hard look at all the days of our lives, we would probably be astonished to see just how much of our life we spend in waiting, and how little we can actually control in our lives. Rather than being frenetically active and anxious to control our lives, can we rest in the reality that God is present, he is here, and he is actively shaping us through His love? Jesus says, You parents if your children ask for a loaf of bread, do you give them a stone instead? Or if they ask for a fish, do you give them a snake? Of course not! If you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Heavenly Father give good gifts to those who ask him. (Matt. 7: 9-11). Can we wait and rest in the reality of the God who says to us, You are my beloved child, I am well pleased with you and I will take care of you? If we did, perhaps then, we might just slow down enough to see Him. Now, I realize that many of us here this morning who prefer action over inactivity, I know that I m already stretching you quite a bit by saying all of these things, so I want to honour how we are all wired differently in how we relate to God, and suggest to you, how do we wait? Where do I go after hearing all of this? Remember that waiting is not complete passivity or abandonment of involvement in the lives of others. Henri Nouwen makes two suggestions for how we may practice waiting together in community. First is to celebrate and affirm in community what God has planted and what He continues to grow. Share with one another where God has acted and where He is acting. Tell each other stories both sad and happy of where you see those shoots and those sprouts of where God is growing something. Second is to pray together. Celebrate and lift up thanks to God. Talk to God. Listen to God. We are not a clockwork mechanism that God just set in motion one day, and stepped back to watch what happened. He is alive and present in community. He is alive and present where people gather together in relationship both good and tragic. A little boy once planted a seed. He was so excited to see this tiny little seed grow into something spectacular. Something that he could taste, eat, and enjoy. He could almost taste the fruit as soon as he planted the seed. And so as soon as the seed was buried in a tiny cup filled with dirt, the boy looked up to his mother and said, When
will it grow, Mom? When will it grow, Mom? When will it grow, Mom? When will it grow, Mom? And he repeated this so incessantly that his mother had to shush him and she said to the boy, The seed will not grow instantly. It takes time to grow. Just be patient. Wait and see. Wait and see. Doing things for Christmas is good. Presents, generosity, sharing food and gifts, being together, these are all good things. Celebrating in community is a great way to celebrate the spirit of Christmas. But the peace of Christmas is not found in our doing. The peace of Christmas is found in our waiting. The peace of Christmas is found when we learn to trust God and not live in fear. It s found when we finally see the baby born. It s found when we hear the Good News declared that we are freed from the tyranny of the chains of busyness. It s found when we see freedom, hope, healing, mercy, and justice arrive in the birth of a King on Christmas Day.