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It seems that coronavirus has turned everything upside down. We are supposed to go to work, and now we have to stay home. For some, we are supposed to have a job to go to, and now we don’t. We are supposed to go to church today and celebrate the resurrection, but now we are at home watching a live stream of a pastor preaching to empty pews. We are supposed to have a big family dinner with friends and loved ones; now it is us four and no more. Indeed, everything seems upside down.
But take a moment to think about what happened Easter morning. Consider the empty tomb and how that has made all the difference. It turned everything upside right. Because of Christ’s resurrection, those living in darkness have seen a great light. Those who were slaves to fear are now children of God. Those who were dead in their trespasses and sins have been raised to life!
The effect of covid 19 pales in comparison to the effect of the resurrected Messiah. Covid 19 constrains us to our houses. Easter sets us free to live lives of joy and happiness no matter where we are. Covid 19 causes illness, anxiety and depression. Easter brings contentment, soul healing and a peace that passes all understanding. Covid 19 keeps us from family members, friends, neighbors and co-workers. Easter connects us to all of humanity through the power and love of the Holy Spirit. Covid 19 turns our world upside down. Easter turns our world upside right.
My wife and I see this everyday. We are part of Foundation For His Ministry’s outreach to needy children in Oaxaca, Mexico. We live in a community with 50 children and about a dozen staff members. Our lives are relatively the same now as before the coronavirus struck. We are one big family – a family in God. An Easter family, you could say. Things that were important and vital to us before the virus infected Mexico are still important to us now. Things like making disciples and making children smile. Sharing the love of God and sharing cookies. Meeting felt needs and meeting to watch movies. We still hug one another, encourage and pray for each other, and share meals together. Sure, we don’t go out into the community as often as we used to, and we are restricted from visiting friends and family members who live outside our Casa Hogar ( home for children). And we wash our hands a lot more! But overall, we are living the same Easter upside right lives that we enjoyed before. Lives free from the bondage of sin and guilt. Lives lived glorifying God and enjoying Him, still believing that He loves us and wants us to be happy.
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Today is Ash Wednesday. The one day of the year when many Christians all over the world will have ashes put on their foreheads in the shape of the cross. This marks the beginning of Lent, a time of waiting in expectation of Easter- Resurrection Sunday. A time of contemplation and inner examination. A time of anticipation and adoration. A time of waiting.
When we wait, we choose. Sometimes we choose to grumble and complain. Sometimes we choose to get frustrated or worried. At times we choose to rejoice and give thanks. Many times our choice depends on what we are waiting for. More often than not, it depends on the kind of person we are. Ultimately we wait patiently or impatiently. It all depends on what’s inside us.
I have read an article and a book recently that have greatly impacted my perspective on patience and what it means to be a patient person. The article is called Silence, Patience and Presence. It is from Fuller Studio. The book is called Liturgy of the Ordinary by Tish Warren. Below are some quotes from both that I hope will impact you as much as they did me.
From Silence, Patience, and Presence – Fuller Studio
Being patient means waiting for a God whose patience outdistances and outlasts our own – we only have a brief span of life to wait; God has eternity. Peter Blum
Christians believe that through cross and resurrection we have been given the time to be patient in a world of impatience I am often in a hurry and busy, but this is not the same thing as impatience. Patience does not mean “doing nothing.” Rather patience is sticking to what you’re doing because you believe that is is worthy and worthwhile. Stanley Haurwas citing John Howard Yoder
Learning to weep, learning to keep vigil, learning to wait for the dawn. Perhaps this is what it means to be human. Henri Nouwen
Ones willingness to be wronged, to absorb evil patiently without retaliating, helps to break the cycle of vengeance and opens up the possibility for healing and peace. Hence though forgiveness is a constitutive practice of peace, forgiveness is unimaginable apart from patience. Philip Kenneson.
Waiting patiently in expectation is the foundation of the spiritual life. Simone Weil
From Liturgy of the Ordinary by Tish Warren
When we practice the Sabbath, we not only look back to God’s rest after his work of creation but we look forward to the rest ahead, to the Sabbath to come when God will finish his work of re-creation. We recall together that we are waiting for the end of the story, for all things to be made new.
In the liturgical year there is never celebration without preparation. First we wait, we mourn, we ache, we repent. We aren’t ready to celebrate until we acknowledge, over time through ritual and worship, that we and this world are not yet right and whole. Before Easter, we have Lent. Before Christmas, we have Advent. We fast. Then we feast. We prepare. We practice waiting.
We want happiness now. Fulfillment and gratification now. I get angry when I have to wait because it reminds me that time is not at my bidding.
Our problem with time is a spiritual problem, one that runs right to the core of who we are as human beings…. Indeed, these distortions drive us into the arms of a false theology: we come to believe that we, not God, are the masters of time. (Dorothy Bass)
Time is a gift from God, a means of worship. Time revolves around God – what he has done, what he is doing, and what he will do.
We live in a waiting world, a world where time itself, along with all of creation, groans in childbirth, waiting for something to be born. We are waiting and hoping. Our present reality is fundamentally oriented toward what is to come.
Waiting is an act of faith that is oriented toward the future. Yet our assurance of hope is rooted in the past, in the person of Jesus of Nazareth and in his promises and resurrection. In this way, waiting, like time itself, centers on Christ-the fulcrum of time.
Scripture tells us that when we “Hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience” (Rom 8:25). We live each ordinary day in the light of a future reality. Our best life is still yet to come.
I have a friend who has struggled with cancer for a long time. She said to me one day,”I always felt like I was waiting for the gift. But I have come to see that the waiting is the gift.” There is more happening while we wait than just waiting. God is at work in us and through us as we wait. Our waiting is active and purposeful.
The church father Tertullian wrote –
The singular mark of patience is not endurance or fortitude, but hope. To be impatient is to live without hope. Patience is grounded in the Resurrection. It is life oriented toward a future that is God’s doing , and its sign is longing, not so much to be released from the ills of the present, but in anticipation of the good to come.
Even now as we wait, God is bringing the kingdom that will one day be fully known. We can be patient because we know there are gifts promised by a Giver who can be trusted.
May your Lent be filled with peace, the presence of God, and patience.
To Enjoy God 