Controlled Waiting

Something interesting happened when our culture moved from an agrarian society to an industrial culture. It got even worse as it became a technological age. Somewhere in there we lost the ability to wait. We expect everything instantly. It has also created this sense, this desire to be in control.

One of the great things the baby Jesus teaches us is that we are NOT in control. Jesus, God's very own son, was not totally in control. Do you remember the prayer he prayed as he was about to be betrayed? "Lord take this cup from me, but not my will but thy will be done." Even for Jesus' life God was in control. So not being in control simply becomes a part of our human condition, and waiting becomes a spiritual activity, a holy thing.

Then Henri Nouwen takes it another notch higher, when in our devotional yesterday he writes, "The spirituality of waiting is not simply our waiting for God. It is also participating in God's own waiting for us and in that way coming to share in the deepest love, which is God's love."

So as Christmas day creeps ever closer we are reminded that we are NOT in control, and so we wait with God and experience God's love.