It’s easier to shop than wait.
Even now, the Cyber Monday deals are a click away.
And it’s not even Monday as I type these words.
Black Friday deals began on Thursday. Cyber Monday began on Saturday.
Nothing waits anymore.
I get it. There are few things more difficult than waiting. And I don’t mean waiting for sales or waiting for food, I mean that utter dependent waiting that is at the heart of the Christian faith.
At the heart of Christmas. Saturday night I felt so discouraged. I was quiet in the car, and Jeff probed to hear my heart, but I tend to stay silent when I’m sad, so I just turned to him in the darkness and said:
Tell me what you’re preaching tomorrow. Preach to me. I need to hear the gospel again.
Of course when I say, “Preach to me” I didn’t mean what that phrase so sadly connotes in our culture. I didn’t mean rant. I didn’t mean lecture or finger-wag or Bible-thump or get loud or list off 3 bullet-points that all cleverly create an acronym for J-O-Y.
I didn’t really need any of that.
I just needed Advent. I needed to know all over again why Jesus came and why His coming, His advent, is the hope of the gospel and why I can rejoice and find comfort and hope in this glorious Good News. I didn’t need it in churchy lingo, I needed it in real words that could take root in a real heart that’s wrestling with real-life stuff.
So he began. He just spoke from his heart, into the darkness, as we drove.
Israel had waited and waited. Four hundred long years of darkness and silence. Of no fresh revelation from God. All the promises of the prophets, spoken through the Old Testament, all of them seemed like a faint whisper from a far-off past.
From so long ago they could barely believe them anymore.
Did God really promise a Messiah?
It’s been so long. It’s been so dark and quiet. So many have given up, lost hope, turned elsewhere and found comfort in other things — in coming up with their own manmade religion to keep themselves occupied because this waiting-on-God thing is just so painfully difficult. They busied themselves with other things, giving up the watching and the waiting and the hoping, because really, let’s face it, there comes a point we just can’t keep waiting for something we cannot see.
Tears filled my eyes in the darkness. I closed them and let the tear slip down my cheek. Now I could hear my own heart:
Waiting is so painful. Did we really hear God promise us this? Does His Word really mean what it says? Do His promises still stand today? What about the silence? The darkness? What about all the stuff that hasn’t happened? What about the UNanswered prayers? What about the unhealed, unloved, unaccepted, unchanged, unwanted? What about the homeless, lifeless, loveless, heartless?
Why keep fighting for hope when it hurts? It’s so much easier to detach from the promise, to shift the focus from faith-filled prayer to “acceptance.” Then at least I can quit waiting and move on to something else.
It’s easier to shop than wait.
But advent reminds us: Christ came.
He came, according to the promise, and there were those were WERE watching and waiting, hoping for the promised blessed hope, the Savior, the Messiah, the Christ. There were the faith-full, like Simeon, who was righteous and devout, waiting for the Consolation of Israel. The Holy Spirit was upon him as he waited, and he did not lose hope.
Advent calls out into the darkness: Wait and do not lose hope.
I wait for the LORD, my soul waits, and in his word I hope;
Psalm 130:5
{For where you are tempted to turn away, give up: Wait, and do not lose hope. Thank you for reading.}
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Isaiah 40New International Version (NIV)
Comfort for God’s People
40 Comfort, comfort my people,
says your God.
2 Speak tenderly to Jerusalem,
and proclaim to her
that her hard service has been completed,
that her sin has been paid for,
that she has received from the Lord’s hand
double for all her sins.
3 A voice of one calling:
“In the wilderness prepare
the way for the Lord[a];
make straight in the desert
a highway for our God.[b]
4 Every valley shall be raised up,
every mountain and hill made low;
the rough ground shall become level,
the rugged places a plain.
5 And the glory of the Lord will be revealed,
and all people will see it together.
For the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”
6 A voice says, “Cry out.”
And I said, “What shall I cry?”
“All people are like grass,
and all their faithfulness is like the flowers of the field.
7 The grass withers and the flowers fall,
because the breath of the Lord blows on them.
Surely the people are grass.
8 The grass withers and the flowers fall,
but the word of our God endures forever.”
9 You who bring good news to Zion,
go up on a high mountain.
You who bring good news to Jerusalem,[c]
lift up your voice with a shout,
lift it up, do not be afraid;
say to the towns of Judah,
“Here is your God!”
10 See, the Sovereign Lord comes with power,
and he rules with a mighty arm.
See, his reward is with him,
and his recompense accompanies him.
11 He tends his flock like a shepherd:
He gathers the lambs in his arms
and carries them close to his heart;
he gently leads those that have young.
12 Who has measured the waters in the hollow of his hand,
or with the breadth of his hand marked off the heavens?
Who has held the dust of the earth in a basket,
or weighed the mountains on the scales
and the hills in a balance?
13 Who can fathom the Spirit[d] of the Lord,
or instruct the Lord as his counselor?
14 Whom did the Lord consult to enlighten him,
and who taught him the right way?
Who was it that taught him knowledge,
or showed him the path of understanding?
15 Surely the nations are like a drop in a bucket;
they are regarded as dust on the scales;
he weighs the islands as though they were fine dust.
16 Lebanon is not sufficient for altar fires,
nor its animals enough for burnt offerings.
17 Before him all the nations are as nothing;
they are regarded by him as worthless
and less than nothing.
18 With whom, then, will you compare God?
To what image will you liken him?
19 As for an idol, a metalworker casts it,
and a goldsmith overlays it with gold
and fashions silver chains for it.
20 A person too poor to present such an offering
selects wood that will not rot;
they look for a skilled worker
to set up an idol that will not topple.
21 Do you not know?
Have you not heard?
Has it not been told you from the beginning?
Have you not understood since the earth was founded?
22 He sits enthroned above the circle of the earth,
and its people are like grasshoppers.
He stretches out the heavens like a canopy,
and spreads them out like a tent to live in.
23 He brings princes to naught
and reduces the rulers of this world to nothing.
24 No sooner are they planted,
no sooner are they sown,
no sooner do they take root in the ground,
than he blows on them and they wither,
and a whirlwind sweeps them away like chaff.
25 “To whom will you compare me?
Or who is my equal?” says the Holy One.
26 Lift up your eyes and look to the heavens:
Who created all these?
He who brings out the starry host one by one
and calls forth each of them by name.
Because of his great power and mighty strength,
not one of them is missing.
27 Why do you complain, Jacob?
Why do you say, Israel,
“My way is hidden from the Lord;
my cause is disregarded by my God”?
28 Do you not know?
Have you not heard?
The Lord is the everlasting God,
the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He will not grow tired or weary,
and his understanding no one can fathom.
29 He gives strength to the weary
and increases the power of the weak.
30 Even youths grow tired and weary,
and young men stumble and fall;
31 but those who hope in the Lord
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint.