I recently discovered that there are books and calendars that give an expectant couple a day-by-day verbal and pictorial description of what is happening to their child in the womb. Today,the baby has a heart. Today, the baby has a stomach. Today, she has fingernails. Today, he hasteeth buds … a nose … eyes … then ears, and a mouth and hair!
Day by day, month by month, Mom, Dad and the baby are coming to be whom God from all timehas desired them to be. With the help of these books, the parents can live in the moment withtheir coming-to-be child, the child they co-created with God.
I wish there were a book that would tell me day-by-day what is going to happen in my life,physically, spiritually, emotionally. Well, there is no book. But there is a Season. The wholetheme of Advent involves waiting … waiting for our life to unfold, moment by moment, day byday, week by week. Schedules and appointments do help, but they are also meaningless. I’mreminded of a local TV commercial by Goshen Hospital; it’s for heart care, and starts by saying:”In 5 minutes, he will have a heart attack.”
In Sunday’s First Reading, the people are tired of waiting for the Lord. In the Gospel thehousehold staff is told to wait for the return of the master. We’re familiar with both forms ofwaiting. Paul in the Second Reading gives us a good antidote: to use the gifts given to us by theSpirit and to trust that the Lord will always hold us firmly and securely until the day we embracethe Lord fully in heaven.
In every line extending from every checkout counter, every traffic jam, every waiting room, everyrestroom, there is Presences in the wait. There is a gift, an invitation, a moment to behold God with-you. God is intimately present in every second of the wait.To wait is to stand in reverence and awe of the Presence in the present. God lives only in thepresent. God knows no time. It is I who live in the confines of time, not God. It is I who ambound by the past and lured by the future. God is and gives only in the present. There is nothingbetter.
Wait in joyful hope for the coming of Jesus!
