“Hurry up and Wait” is one way in which to characterize our life on earth.

It’s also an old army slogan, used to describe what happens in the service. You march along quickly to one position, only to be told once you get there, to wait, until further notice. You do not have to serve in the army to realize life is a series of hurrying up and waiting moments; pointing to a future expectation and yet placed in a present reality.

When arriving in a southwest Florida, coastal town, a parishioner approached a newly ordained deacon, wishing him well, and welcoming him to what he called, “God’s waiting room.” It takes time for a statement like this to really take hold. One could say this is an expectation of what lies ahead. Or, one could say the emphasis is what lies on the surface. Why does this have to be an either/or situation? How come it can’t be both as the parishioner suggests? Hurrying to get somewhere, yet figuring out what to do in the meantime, is something all of us go through at one time or another.

Once there was a man named Patrick who experienced this. He lived in the foothills of the cascade mountains, in the small town of Yacolt, Washington. The scenery was picturesque. From his bed, Patrick could see across the meadows and every day he watched the horses he and his wife owned, as they tromped and grazed through the lush grass. But for a long time he felt that this place was a waiting room. He felt this way because of a forklift accident he suffered a few years before his planned retirement. On top of this, a pair of strokes worsened his situation. Life, before, seemed to be on a fast course until all of this happened. Now, he didn’t care much about anything. Living had become an effort, not a joy. Living had become a dreary chore.

A sharp pain shot through his leg at that moment, and that is when he heard the car pull up. He didn’t bother to look because he just assumed it was his wife Marilyn, and it was. With a big smile on her face, she popped into the bedroom, not even bothering to ask him how he was feeling. Instead she said, “Hi honey” and thrust in front of him a big hunk of wood. “Make me a fish”, she said. “A what,” Patrick asked. “Lord, I think you have lost your mind.” She went on. “I was in town and came across this man who carved things out of wood.”; birds, people, fish, you name it. This piece of wood cost me nearly forty dollars. We’re tight with money, but the thought just came to me. I know how much you always wanted to go fishing, now make me a fish.” Unrelenting, she put it on his bed. It just stared at him for days. He began to wonder, “How am I going to carve anything, when I can’t even get out of bed?”

The next day he finally mustered up the strength, and made it all the way to his garage, finding his sander. Taking the wood in his hands, he put it in the vice and went to work. He followed the grain, enjoying the sense of its smooth touch; the smell of the sanded off dust. Suddenly he found something he could do a little bit at a time. By the end of the week he found his pace. Hurrying up when he had the strength and waiting as he needed breath, he found a new chore in life; one that wasn’t so dreary. Watching the horses out of his window for the longest time from his waiting room, he never thought or dreamed he would ever earn a living with his arms and legs again. He once thought, “What good am I?” Now, three years later, his highly prized and sought after carved salmon, gives him a different kind of living. He believes these carvings are just outward and visible signs, of something that is inward and spiritual. They give him an understanding of who he is, and to whom he belongs. Like the fish he is reminded that sometimes you will have to swim upstream, against the current, against all the forces that can weaken you.

​We all wish to feel what it is like to truly live; to be alive, as if we were just born, coming into something new for the first time. People don’t always understand life’s difficulties, like depression, until they’ve gone through it themselves. People like Patrick who knew what it was like to live an active life, may suddenly have a difficult choice, learning “How to wait” once again. Like it can be for the newborn baby, first beginnings can come with great fear, as we are reminded by the Psalmist, “Behold the eye of the Lord is upon those who fear him on those who wait upon his love.”[1] We should come to realize that the fear is not about what the Lord will take away from us now or the future expectation of what lies ahead in heaven. The fear comes from forgetting to live by faith. By our faith, God carves us out, shapes us upon his promise. That big hunk of wood thrust out in front of us, is that promise. It is the shape of the cross.

In the hurry up and wait of our own lives, what do we see through the window of our own waiting room? Does life spring out of us, imagining what is beneath the purple veil of a long-fasting, long-suffering period of Lent? Faith brings forth the expectation of what is to come and what can be; the shape and outline of Christ who takes his time with us, without hurry, and then calls us to follow him, without wait. We hurry to the words, “For God so loved the world”, believing in Him, but we wait for that promise, “you shall not perish, but have everlasting life.” On that hunk of wood, thrust before us, is the pain and suffering that he too had to endure just like ours, collectively; entirely. When Jesus told Nicodemus, “Truly, truly I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God,” He was giving notice for what was to come.[2] To be born again is something that should be ongoing in each of us every day. We should choose to believe in the future promise, as well as to live in the present reality with a holy patience and a ready, “can-do” approach to life. This position is most helpful in the midst of our pain and suffering.

Like Abraham, we are to make our sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving for what we have; asking God to shape us through the moments when we get stuck, idling in our woes. God leads us through the dark valleys; through the shadow lands of our personal wilderness. Find joy by allowing him to fashion you, shaping and carving your heart’s desire to be born again; to be fully loved.

Always know where you’re going, put your trust in Jesus to lead you, and always be prepared to hurry up and wait.

[1] Psalm 33:18
[2] John 3:1-17