If you’re like me, one of the most disagreeable experiences is waiting. This is something we’ve had to learn over the last few days as we negotiate our way through crowded streets. And who can forget waiting in a doctor or dentist office for an hour and a half! Then, there are friends and relatives who are always late! We agree on a time and place secretly knowing that we will be waiting on the corner or in the lobby.
In today’s Gospel reading (Matthew 11:2-11), we find John the Baptizer in his jail cell – waiting. His unfortunate situation, you may recall, came about because he (John) objected when King Herod stole his brother’s wife. For his trouble, John was tossed in jail and eventually lost his head. But right now, John sits waiting: a) to get out of jail and b) to get Jesus’ answer to the question he had sent by messenger: “Are you really the Messiah we’ve been waiting for these hundreds of years or do we keep on waiting?”
The report came back to John: “Go and report what you hear and see; the blind see, the lame walk, the deaf hear, the dead are raised and the poor have good news preached to them.” And the messenger delivered a footnote: “Happy is the man who does not lose faith in me.”
Happy is the person who is enough to know that his final and complete fulfillment waits upon GOD’s time. St. Paul was a happy man for just this reason. Like John, he was held prisoner for offending the civil authority by openly preaching Jesus Christ. Like John, Paul sent messages and letters from his prison cell. One such message was sent to his companion, Timothy. In it, the apostle wrote: “I am experiencing hardships now, but I have not lost confidence, because I know who it is I have put my trust in, and I have no doubt that he is able to take care of all that I have entrusted to Him until that day.” What faith! Happy was St. Paul because he knew, even as he languished in jail, that completed fulfillment would come in GOD’S GOOD TIME – and he was willing to wait.
Think for a moment of the longtime married couple sleeping in their home at midnight and suddenly becoming aware of the ominous small of smoke! The husband leaped from the bed and, after quickly surveying the situation, announced that the rear of the house was in flames. He then calmly led his wife on a seemingly endless crawl through the house to the front door. As they crawled through the house to the front door. As they crawled through the front doorway, the husband couldn’t help but notice a broad smile on his wife’s face. “Good grief,” he said, “what could possibly make you smile in a situation like this?” “Sorry,” she replied, “I couldn’t help remembering that this is the first night we’ve been out together in months!”
Now that’s patience! But most of us aren’t known for our enduring patience. The Old Testament prophet Habakkuk is a more likely model for us. Unlike St. Paul, whose words indicate perfect trust and confidence in God, Habakkuk spoke with an impatience we all know too well. God’s people were suffering at the hands of a cruel oppressor. “How long will God allow this to happen?” he wrote “How long am I to cry for help while you will not listen?” he cries out to God.
God’s response comes back to Habakkuk in a vision wherein it is revealed that all that appears to be wrong will be made right: God will fulfill His promises: the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the Glory of God. But . . . “This vision will be fulfilled at the appointed time” – GOD’S TIME.
How little we know of God’s time! But isn’t that what faith is really all about? Our minds are boggled as we reflect on Planet Earth’s extremely minute position in the overall time of an incomprehensibly vast universe. Consider the fact that it would take thousands of light years to reach any of the billions of stars in the Milky Way Galaxy alone. Then think that four and a half billion years have passed in the earth’s existence and the period of man’s history begins about 5,000 years ago. GOD’S TIME.
God does not offer us instant total fulfillment. Fulfillment, yes! Total fulfillment, yes! But all in good time – all in GOD’S TIME. We need to grace our lives with the patience to grow into a sincere admission of our dependencies upon God’s plan for our fulfillment. We need to pray and meditate regularly upon who we are, where we are going and what we ought to do. We need to see our lives in the perspective of God’s time through reflection on the Creator, the Universe, and our human family.
“Happy is the person who does not lose faith in me,” reminds Jesus’ message to John. It is a universal message to each of us especially at the Season of Advent when we wait, plan and prepare for the coming of the Christ at Christmas. Our fulfillment will come – in GOD’S TIME.
Source: © The Rev. Peter Groschner, December 15, 2019. Matthew 11:2-11. Reprinted with permission from the author.