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How much of
human life is lost in waiting?
--
Ralph Waldo Emerson
The
Christmas
Wait
Christmas is full of waiting. We
wait at checkouts (and then Returns counters)
and at airports. We wait for mail and for
gifts. We wait in crowds. We wait alone. We wait with
anticipation. We wait with dread. As children, December
25 could never come quickly enough. Even Christmas Eve
could feel like a
week!
The first Christmas was no different. Luke
begins the story with Elizabeth and Zacharias who
had waited a lifetime for a child. Then Zacharias must
wait for the birth before he can speak again. Similarly, Mary and
Joseph's story becomes one of waiting -- not sitting
around, but waiting; waiting nine months for the end of
her God-orchestrated pregnancy, for the world's first glimpse of the
Son of God. Meanwhile, Simeon and Anna waited at the temple for
"the consolation of Israel" (Luke 2:25) and "the redemption of Jerusalem"
(Luke 2:38).
Everything about Christmas, from the
first to the current, speaks of waiting. Lots of
it.
Not that we like it
at all. Wait and waste sound too much
alike. "Don't just stand there. Do something.
Anything!" Waiting is neither something nor
anything. In our life's economy, it's
nothing.
But
waiting forms the centerpiece
of the biblical Christmas story. By contrast, words like
rush and chaos mark our Christmas
story. No time to wait -- or waste. Like Martha much
later, hospitality means hurry
.
Yet, as we learn to wait
with hope, attentiveness, submission, and patience, we
see the Child. Jesus does not yell over the blare of
Christmas music. Nor does He create a spectacle more
dazzling than decorations or parades. He does not force
His way into our gift-opening traditions, nor over-ride
our feasting and football. He too waits. He tarries in
the stillness.
This season will be filled with the usual waiting
-- most of which
drives us crazy, creates stress and conflict, and irritates us. But
might we engage a different kind of wait
-- one filled with promise, awareness, and anticipation? A
wait that adds meaning to the season and
prepares us for the Christ ... a prayerful
wait.
Emerson's quote (above) lacks accuracy. We don't lose
life by waiting, especially as we wait expectantly and
attentively on Christ. To the contrary, we find it. May
this Christmas be filled with the best kind of waiting
for each of us.
In HOPE
-
David |
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