Patience is a virtue, we’re taught. Good things come to those who wait.
But waiting isn’t easy. I learned this when I was nine years old. My parents were ahead of the game that year, and had our presents wrapped and under the Christmas tree soon after Thanksgiving. One night, about two weeks before Christmas Eve, the waiting became too much. I snuck out of my bedroom, grabbed the present I’d been eyeing under the tree, and whisked it back to my bed. It was large in length and width, but skinny enough to slip nicely between my bed and the wall. I was too guilty to open it all at once, so each night after being tucked in bed, I peeled back a bit of the wrapping paper. Finally, the box’s graphics appeared: Construx! Nice. Phew. Suspense relieved. Now to get this partially unwrapped gift back under the tree . . . Somehow I managed, but the lesson came on Christmas Eve. Not only was it clear I hadn’t fooled anyone with my heist, I also distinctly recall how the usual thrill of the family gift exchange was somehow hollow. I’d missed out on the point. Getting a new possession (the Construx!) is one thing, but experiencing it as Gift—undeserved, un-entitled, unexpected, no strings attached—that’s something worth waiting for.
Advent, these weeks spent waiting for Christmas, teaches us this sort of wisdom. It teaches us patient perseverance in awaiting the arrival of God and the Gifts God brings. Traditionally, we highlight the gifts of Hope, Peace, Joy, and Love through the four weeks leading to Christmas.
And yet, whenever I hear myself talking up the virtues of Advent waiting, I’m prodded by the title of a book by Martin Luther King, Jr.: Why We Can’t Wait. It’s a short book he wrote to flesh out the story of his “Letter from Birmingham Jail.” In 1963, King led a series of boycotts over the week of Easter in Birmingham, Alabama. Not only was Easter the second-highest shopping season of the year, but in 1963 it also happened to follow the election of a new police chief to replace the infamous Bull Conner. Even some people generally supportive of the Civil Rights movement, including some well known clergy, were critical of King’s “timing.” After King was arrested and jailed for leading a march in spite of a court injunction, he penned a letter that began with these words:
My Dear Fellow Clergymen:
While confined here in the Birmingham city jail, I came across your recent statement calling my present activities “unwise and untimely.”
He then proceeds to explain the Southern Christian Leadership Conference’s reasoning for going ahead with the boycotts and marches. And then,
Frankly, I have yet to engage in a direct action campaign that was “well timed” in the view of those who have not suffered unduly from the disease of segregation. For years now I have heard the word “Wait!” It rings in the ear of every Negro with piercing familiarity. This “Wait” has almost always meant “Never.” We must come to see, with one of our distinguished jurists, that “justice too long delayed is justice denied.” …
Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging darts of segregation to say, “Wait.” …
There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into the abyss of despair. I hope, sirs, you can understand our legitimate and unavoidable impatience.
Sometimes impatience is a virtue. Waiting for a present at Christmas is one thing. Waiting for justice delayed is quite another.
At the start of Advent 2018, I’m wondering, When is waiting a virtue to be cultivated, and when is waiting a temptation to be overcome?
With those questions in mind, I’m finding myself adding a word to my description of Advent: longing. Advent is about waiting and longing. It’s more than simply improving our exercise of self-discipline. It’s about cultivating and awakening our longing for things that have been too long delayed.
For the biblical people waiting for and expecting Messiah, sometimes the task of the prophets was to push back against their impatience that settled for quick—and ultimately unsatisfying—fixes. But the prophets also spent a lot of time pushing back against apathy, singing out wake-up calls, trying to light a fire of longing in a people that had grown too content with injustice and empire and status quo.
So as we work our way toward Christmas and the end of 2018, we allow Advent to cultivate an (im)patient, persevering longing in us—for Hope, Peace, Joy, and Love. For justice. For healing. For good news worthy of great joy for all people.
I’m grateful for the friends who will help guide us along the way. Each day between now and Christmas, La Sierra church members will be offering reflections on what Gift they’re longing for and where they seeing hints of its arrival. And if you get inspired with your own reflection, there’s space to hear from you! Please send me an email at vnelson@lasierra.church.
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