"And Yet, We Wait" by Lisa Shoemaker

My father hates to wait in lines.

No, I mean he really, really hates it. Nobody loves standing in lines until it is “your turn,” but this man places such a societal necessity at the top of his “Things I Really Hate” list.  He will always just “go later” or not at all in some cases.

I fear that I have inherited this impatient trait, but thankfully I am married to a man who seems to have an unlimited capacity for waiting. He can sit at the License Bureau, waiting for his name to be called for over an hour and not fidget and complain like I do. So, if you are among the “I can wait” crowd, you have my admiration. You have my admiration because you will probably fare better than the rest of us as we anticipate what the last few weeks in 2020 will look like. While some political factions have tried to assure us that a vaccine before year’s end will change things for us all, others are more skeptical about whether a safe, effective vaccine will materialize in 2021. So . . . we wait.

Waiting was nothing new to the early followers of the Christ. They were waiting for the Messiah to come back to earth again within their lifetimes. They were waiting for Rome to fall and God’s Kingdom to reign in the way they had envisioned such a kingdom. They were waiting for persecution to end and for justice to prevail. However, like us, they had no idea exactly when any of this would occur. So . . . they waited.

But I am discovering that waiting can have certain advantages. First, it gives me time to reconsider my courses of action. Are they really necessary? Will they really serve the purpose I intend, bring me some peace or joy, or solve a particular problem? If I choose a different path, would that be a kinder way to go? A fairer way to go? If “good things go to those who wait,” then bring on the good things!

Secondly, waiting slows me down. I cannot plan as swiftly and as surely as I used to (before . . . you know what), so I can have that extra cup of coffee in the morning; I can sort through email or write a church blog while I wait on Jim to get ready to walk with me; I can stop watching the news as I wait for the New Normal to arrive and instead watch another episode of M*A*S*H*. No one is really in a hurry these days. Waiting is still not my favorite way to practice patience, but I have to admit I’m getting better at it every day.

When I was considering what we would do about our dear family wedding that is supposed to take place next month, I decided I would embrace the attitude that the bride has when she recently told us that a small, private ceremony and the party would take place as scheduled with a bigger soiree to follow, post-virus: “Oh, well, there are worse things than having to throw two parties!” Amen, Jessica; amen.