In the Waiting

“If we let ourselves, we shall always be waiting..." - C.S. Lewis

Waiting is such a funny thing. The whole idea of waiting implies that we are anticipating something to come, anticipating a specific event or feeling or situation that we foresee as being better than our current event or feeling or situation. Yet it seems the more we wait, the further we get from what it is we are waiting for. We get so wrapped up in what's to come that we never get to what we were trying to get to at all. We simply dwell so much in the ever-elusive future that we somehow miss the present. 

I seem to be one of these perpetual waiters, always reaching for the next thing that's just barely out of my reach. I see my present circumstances as just a distraction, a waste of time, from the "better" circumstances ahead. I wait to check out my groceries, I wait in traffic, I wait for the doctors to write me orders, I wait to graduate, I wait to be married to my best friend... The list could go on for hours, but then, my friend, I would keep you waiting on the entire point of my ramblings. And that would be a dreadful waste of time. 

A few years ago, I was part of a Broadway-sized production that portrayed the life and ministry of Jesus. The production itself required two hundred cast members, a huge choir, a panel of directors, and two camels. One of the biggest things I learned was that, for the entire production to run smoothly, each person had to be in exactly their right place at exactly their right time, as determined by the director. Each person's time and place was just a little bit different, but that was their cue. And when everyone was right "on cue", the complete scene was more beautiful than anyone could have created on their own.

That is precisely what God has been showing me. My own ideas of time and place for my life seem pretty good to me, but they aren't part of the beautiful picture of salvation God is painting all around me.  It might take me years to learn, but God is teaching me what it means to live each moment for His glory, in exactly the time and place He makes for me.

Psalm 27:14 says, "Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord." Waiting for God takes courage. He isn't one to operate on our schedules and inside our own dreams, and perhaps at the end of our lives we will find we were only waiting for the next life all along. But what would happen if, as Christians, we quit trying to dwell in the places only God can go and fully embraced this moment, this second, as if we had only this moment? God may be in our past, present, and future, but we only have right now.

So this is a record of my struggles to anticipate only heaven and to love and to live in the meantime. It is a testament to the unfailing grace of a God who invites me to a bigger story, His story, a story that requires me to submit to His time and place for my life.

And somewhere between my waiting for something better and desiring something bigger, I would say God is meeting me right On Queue.