Waiting for the Win

As I start typing this morning, the song playing in the background of my kitchen is “I’m waiting on you, Lord, though it’s not easy, but faithfully I will wait”.

We spend a lot of our time waiting, don’t we? This time of year, we might spend a little extra time waiting in lines as we fill our carts with Christmas plunder, hoping the gift we’ve picked out will be sure to bring joy to its recipient. If you’re a parent, you’re familiar with the period of waiting; waiting to become pregnant or adopt, waiting for the day your child will arrive. If you’re a homeowner, you’ve experienced a much-awaited closing date. Maybe the waiting was done studying hard to achieve a degree or working long hours for the one day you’d achieve that promotion you’ve patiently earned.

This period of waiting for Christmas is Advent and it’s a time of preparation while we wait. We not only await the birth of Jesus, but His second coming as well. I had the pleasure of teaching the kiddos at my church about Advent a few weeks ago on the first Sunday of Advent. It can be difficult to treat all “waiting” as excited anticipation like we have for Christmas day. If only all the waiting could be exciting like an upcoming trip you’ve planned for months or the day that increased salary kicks in.

I will serve you while I’m waiting. I will worship while I’m waiting.

Waiting is not easy. My career has been based on making plans to work our way to a finish line while I coach those who are waiting, ensuring them of the date when we’ll be done, mentoring & encouraging when the date gets pushed out and the waiting grows longer. I feel like the rest of my life will be spent waiting; waiting for the pain to stop.  I try to focus on what I’m waiting for and not the waiting itself. Nearly impossible.

The holidays are so difficult because of the memories we have of better times. Everyone else seems happy and inside I’m begging God to come get us. Let this waiting finally be over. Nearly two years of asking Why?, trying to be patient, waiting for the wisdom I so desperately pray for, pushing back the dark. I look around and there are only a select few that really get me and really understand this pain.  Every day I say “I can’t do this.” Every day it’s my belief in God that allows me to carry on and continue waiting another day. One more day closer to the time when the pain will finally be gone. This morning I read in Jesus Calling “For our light, momentary affliction is ever and more abundantly preparing and producing and achieving for us an everlasting weight of glory (beyond all measure, excessively surpassing all comparisons and all calculations, a vast and transcendent glory and blessedness never to cease!)” 2 COR 4:17

I literally can’t wait.

Have you ever been waiting only to encounter someone who decides the rules don’t apply to them? Oh yah, you know the ones. They decide that they can do whatever they want and still win. How do you figure? It’s like a coach telling his basketball team, “Boys, get out there and play but don’t worry about making the shot, you’ll still win.”

“But coach, I thought we had to make baskets to win the game?”

“Oh no, I decided we get to win no matter what. And that ref, pay no attention to him. Just go out there and do whatever you want and you’ll still win”.        Huh? 

A few months ago I was put in a position where God had me witness to what I’d call a partial-believer. There is belief in God that created heaven, earth & the life on it, but not a belief in the rules for salvation.  I believe in God, but I don’t believe I’m going to suffer eternal damnation just because I don’t believe Jesus was who he says he was.  Maybe it was just coincidence Jesus showed up hundreds of years after Isaiah and the prophets had predicted the Messiah’s coming and fulfilled what scripture predicted. Not just one prophecy, ALL of them. AND He performed miracles the most scholarly Pharisees of that time couldn’t explain.

Was it all a hoax or magic? Coincidence? Luck? How could you explain the healing of the blind, the deaf, lepers? Feeding thousands, raising the dead? Jesus’ own resurrection. Maybe Jesus had the help of many to just maneuver his life to perfectly match up with everything that had been written hundreds of years before his birth? How could he have arranged his ancestry as predicted, his birthplace, his method of execution (predicted before crucifixion even existed), his miracles? There were witnesses, thousands of people.  He drew crowds of people, non-believers who had to see to believe and those who knew if they could just touch the hem of His garment. . . Then it was written down and Jesus sent His best out on the road to spread the word. The New Testament has all the proof you need to believe God sent Jesus, His Son, to fulfill Old Testament prophecies, to establish a new covenant and give you ONE rule to follow to win big.

I made a statement the other day and Wyatt didn’t believe me. He had to Google it only to prove me right. I’ll take my gold star now. Sometimes it takes a little work to research an answer and gain knowledge of something you didn’t know before. You can go on living as if you get to make the rules and still win, but I invite you to read Isaiah 7:14 where he revealed the Messiah’s birth (of a virgin), Micah 5:1 referencing the messiah’s birth in Bethlehem, Jeremiah 23:5 calling out His ancestry from David, the Gospels documenting Jesus’ predictions of his own death & resurrection. He gives them the new playbook to win the kingdom of Heaven available to all who believe. Best Christmas Gift Ever.