Third Sunday of Advent

Sunday, December 14, 2008

St. David’s Episcopal Church, DeWitt NY

The Rev. James C. Bresnahan, Interim Rector

“Waiting”

It is Advent. Once again we have been waiting for Christ to be born.  Once again we are waiting before we join shepherds on earth and angels above to sing the carols of Christmas. 

Not everyone waits.

Department stores, of course, don’t wait. Shelves need always to be stocked. Soon after Halloween, in the middle of the night, all the Halloween candy and costumes are put away and all the Christmas wear appears.

But we wait.  We create this space for waiting that we call Advent.

Advent waiting is the kind of waiting Scripture urges on us, when St. Paul writes: Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.

Advent waiting is good waiting, godly waiting, patient waiting, prayerful waiting.

But first, let us name those other kinds of waiting that do us little good.

To begin, there is idle waiting, waiting while time frits away and nothing of use happens - the waiting of boredom, the waiting born of no plans and no goals, the waiting that is drifting. You might call that kind of waiting freecell waiting. It is wasting time.  It is wasted waiting.

Some spend years in that kind of waiting - some congregations too when they are not driven by a vision born of prayer.

Then there is impatient waiting. 

Like the waiting of a child for Christmas to come who looks under beds during Advent for hidden Christmas presents and, finding them wrapped, shakes the boxes to find what might be inside.

Impatient waiting is waiting that hasn’t learned to wait. 

It’s when someone interrupts others’ sentences because they can’t wait for others to finish their sentences themselves.  It’s when you are told you need to rest after surgery, but you push yourself anyway and make things worse. It’s when we rush to make decisions that need more time for careful thinking.  It’s when, wanting something so bad, we don’t wait for the right time and end up in debt or other difficulty. That’s impatient waiting.

Then there is anxious waiting – waiting that we fill with excessive worry, incapacitating worry, like the overly anxious waiting of a father-to-be decades ago in a community south of here.

A true story it is.  His wife was nine months pregnant and near to giving birth.  He kept saying to her in this waiting time, “Is it now?  Is it now?”  Every frantic minute of every hour!

Late in the evening, after he had questioned her for the five hundredth time that day, she said, It’s time!  Frantically, he grabbed the small suitcase from the bedroom to take to the hospital.  Ten minutes later, while driving 80 miles an hour on a fifteen-mile ride toward the hospital, he heard sirens behind him and in his side-view mirror saw the reflection of flashing lights.  He pulled over to the roadside.  The police officer got out, walked over to his car and asked, “Where are you going so fast”?  “To the hospital.” he yelled. “Can’t you see?  Can’t you see? My wife’s going to have a baby!”  The officer looked into the car and shot back, “What wife”? 

Barely had they arrived back home when the wife delivered her baby in the bedroom.

Anxious waiting, impatient waiting, idle waiting - they are all ways of waiting that do not leave us in a good place or take us to a good place.

The four-week space in the calendar called Advent, which holds Christmas at bay, beckons us to a different kind of waiting: a prayerful waiting, a focused waiting, an attentive waiting, a productive waiting, in which we listen for the voice and leading of God.  It is the waiting of prophets, who amid calamity, war, and exile waited with hope and through the inspiration of God spoke words of encouragement to those in despair.  It is the waiting of John the Baptist, who kept looking in hope until he found the one who was to come and then pointed others to him. It is the waiting of Mary who despite possibility of miscarriage trusted and rejoiced in God and cared for the child within her womb, until the child should be revealed to the world.

It is the waiting of the poet John Milton, gone blind, who learned through prayer to say: “They also serve who only stand and wait."

Some years ago when I was writing short stories and poems, I wrote about such patient waiting and watching in this brief story:

Each new day, while the rising sun kisses the garden dew, a widow, twenty years alone, snips three flowers - sometimes four, which she places in a blue glass vase on a table before a bright bay window.

She brings to the table a tea service for two, of fine china, with silver spoons, and an heirloom sugar bowl that her mother, and mother's mother too, had reserved for finest occasions.

And from a full kettle, kept simmering, she will pour tea, should someone chance to visit - perhaps some old, old friend (though most have died), perhaps some long lost relative, or a stranger asking for directions.

She does not remember when last someone came. Was it five years ago? Or ten?  No matter!

At the close of each solitary day, emptying the kettle and vase, she rinses and returns to the cupboard the tea service for two, where it will stay until night has passed and she rises again, expectant like the morning sun.

God invites us to practice that kind of hopeful and patient waiting, especially when times are hard or someone we love is facing surgery, or near to dying, or has Alzheimer’s Disease. Or, when we are hurting or grieving, and healing takes time.

Prayerful waiting, Advent waiting, hopeful waiting, puts the future in God’s hands and trusts God for it.  It pays attention to the needs of the day and what needs doing for Christ to be born anew in our hearts. 

So we pray in this season that, trusting God, we not rush things, avoid things, or succumb to discouragement over the fear of anything.

Instead, we attend to deepening and strengthening relationships with those we are committed to, such as our congregational relationships with Springfield Gardens, St. David’s Court, food pantries, and other ministries.

We attend to the children among us whose lives and values we are shaping by what we do and don’t do.

We attend in love and compassion to those who are hospitalized, grieving, or fearful. I know that some of you right now are ministering to friends, neighbors, or family who are in such dire or difficult circumstance.

And we attend to allowing ourselves to be loved.

The Lord is at hand. Rejoice always; pray without ceasing; give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.