Thought for Today
Genesis 49:18 I wait for your salvation, O Lord.
Psalm 25:5 Lead me in your truth, and teach me, for you are the God of my salvation; for you I wait all day long.
Matthew 11:2 When John heard in prison what the Messiah was doing, he sent word by his disciples 3 and said to him, "Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?"
Romans 8:25 But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.
“To wait – to stay where one is or delay action until a particular time or until something else happens.” Shakespeare may have been correct when, in Romeo and Juliet, Act 2, Scene 2 Juliet says, “Good night, good night! Parting is such sweet sorrow, that I shall say good night till it be morrow.” If parting is sweet sorrow, waiting is something else entirely.
Many of us are familiar with the joke about praying to God, “Dear God, I want patience . . . and I want it right now!” There are times for us all when that seems like a reasonable request to make (demand?) to God.
The word ‘wait’ appears approximately 100 times in scripture. It appears in both the Old Testament and the New Testament. It appears often in literature, both fiction and non-fiction. Irrespective of its ubiquity, however, it is not something any of us really like to do or to be forced to experience.
The prophet in Ecclesiastes gives us that now-familiar phrase, “3:1 For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven.” Qoheleth goes on to posit a series of opposites, expressing the belief that there is an appropriate time of each, e.g., “2 a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted.”
Every time I read the words of Qoheleth, I am reminded of the fact that, when I worked in Saudi Arabia, the Saudis with whom I worked joked (?) that the definition of ‘instantaneous’ is “the interval between the traffic light changing to green and the honking of the first car horn behind you.” The desire to have patience and to have it right now is universal and ubiquitous in all phases of our very human lives.
I do remember as a young man being impatient to grow older, to mature, to be an adult. I distinctly remember thinking that the intervening years between my current age and being old enough to vote seemed insurmountable. Now, the intervening years between being able to vote and my current age still seem insurmountably long . . . merely viewed from a different perspective.
We see the impatience, the aversion to waiting, reflected in scripture and in our spiritual lives. Repeatedly, God’s people realize that things are not going the way God intended. Repeatedly, God’s people seek and search, look for a pathway back into right relationship with God. Far too often, they become impatient and wander off, vainly chasing after one false prophet after another, changing their allegiance to one false god after another.
We cannot say that things have become universally better in our own age. As our world becomes more technologically advanced, as our population grows, as more and more of us live in crowded, urban environments, false gods and false prophets abound.
We see, hear and read countless stories lately about AI. Stories about how AI will soon take over every aspect of our lives, cure every problem in our lives. Permeate everything in our lives. It may come to be so. It may not come to be so. There is certainly great potential for good in artificial intelligence. Regrettably, there is also great potential for evil in its misapplication.
Whether it is used for good or for evil, or some combination of both, neither AI nor any other creation of mankind will bring about that for which we so often pray, God’s will being done on earth as it is in heaven. The Kingdom of God will come about when the gospel good news penetrates the hearts of all mankind. That will only come about when we all live our own, individual lives based on that gospel good news. We must patiently pursue our daily lives based on the life and teachings of Jesus. We are enabled to do so by Jesus’ promise, “John 14:2 In my Father's house there are many dwelling places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also.”
Stay safe, wait patiently, trust God,
Pastor Ray
