We wait a lot in life—in lines, in traffic, in waiting rooms. We wait for apps to load, for texts, for phone calls. We wait for far more important things like jobs, raises, homes, diagnoses. We wait for news—good or bad. Waiting can sometimes be joyful as it is when we wait during Advent. However, much of the waiting we face feels overwhelming. We wait too much and too long for too many things, unsure if God will bring those things about at all. It can be tempting to stall during this waiting—to give up until we get what we need or want.
Perhaps as we wait for things both bad and good, we can wait without stalling, without giving up. Perhaps we can wait with the same sense of wonder about what we will encounter along the way.
This message is an excerpt of the Give Us This Day column, “Wait,” by Rebecca Eve Schweitzer in the December 2016 issue of Gather magazine. Today is the third Sunday of Advent. The readings are Isaiah 35:1-10; Psalm 146:5-10; Luke 1:46b-55 (alternate); James 5:7-10; Matthew 11:2-11.
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