The Waiting Game

If you are familiar with the iconic “Princess Bride” movie, you may remember a scene in which Inigo Montoya is waiting to match his sword-fighting skills against the masked man.  The only difficulty is that the masked man is climbing a cliff—a bit too slowly for Inigo.  He asks the masked man if he could speed things up a bit?  Though Inigo does admit he is only waiting to kill him, the masked man insists he will just have to wait!  To which Inigo replies, “I hate waiting!” 

I think we could all agree with that sentiment.  We seem to wait all the time.  As much as our computerized, technologically advanced world claims to make things happen more and more quickly, it would appear that all those gadgets do is cause more waiting.  We wait for an automated phone system to finally connect us to the extension we are trying to reach.  We wait on hold because our “call is very important to them.”  We wait to make appointments.  We sit and wait in offices.  We wait in line at the store.  We wait for someone to find our account on their computer.  We wait while our computer does makes that whimsical hourglass motion, or perhaps an unending circular motion which indicates it’s working—but not as quickly as we would like! We wait in traffic.

We wait, and wait, and wait… 

Imagine the time of waiting for the Jewish people.  From the time of Adam and Eve, they had been given a promise.  One would be born who would be the “seed of the woman.”  (Genesis 3)  This One would be among the offspring of Abraham, whose family would outnumber the stars of the heavens. (Genesis 15:5)  This Savior would set them free from slavery, even as Moses had led the people from their slavery in Egypt.  The promised One would come from the lineage of King David. (Psalm 132:11, 12)  The Israelites had been waiting for His coming for many  centuries.

Another waited—a man named Simeon.  He was an elderly man who had received a promise from God as well:  He would not die before he had seen the Messiah—the promised Deliverer. 

Amidst all those who waited, no one was waiting with more anticipation than a young virgin. She who had received the promise from an angel, and now carried within her the One promised from ages past, waited. She waited while living in a culture that would have stoned her for her rounding abdomen, had it not been for Joseph, the man to whom she had been promised. She waited while seeing her people continue to suffer under the oppression of the Romans.  She waited for the time of her delivery, and for the deliverance of her nation. 

And though the Jewish people, the simple man, and the maiden mother saw their waiting come to an end with the birth of that small child in a lowly stable in Bethlehem, there are those who still wait.  We wait. 

We begin Advent with reminders of the prophecies given so long ago. We wait as we hold within our hearts the same expectancy of our forebears. Yet, we also wait with another hope. 

For we have been promised that this amazing One will come again! The Deliverer will return one day, and deliver us completely from this world of pain, suffering, wars, famines, droughts, floods, and starvation.  He will set us free from a society that is bent on self-destruction and the destruction of the Church the Savior came to establish.  He will loose the bonds of sin that hold our world captive.  

Most important of all, He will set us free…from waiting.. 

Wait patiently, my friends, and have a blessed Advent.