"Waiting Room"

“Waiting Room”

 Luke 1:23-25, 39-45

 December 5, 2010    Advent                                                             

                                                                 

I want to invite you into the waiting room—that’s right, come in and have a seat.  Let me tell you what you are waiting for.  This is a maternity waiting room.  The people who are here are waiting for births.  You say you don’t belong in this room?  You are not about to give birth?  But, who are the others in this waiting room?  There is Elizabeth.  She is too old to give birth, but there she is awaiting the promise of the angel.  And there, there is Mary. She is too young to have a child.  She is poor and not even married.  Yet, she is there waiting for the promise of the angel.   So, don’t feel you are out of place here.  It seems that none of us are beyond the promise of God; there is a purpose and mystery with your name on it.  There is a message of hope for you and for me.  We are all pregnant with the promise of God.

What will we do here as we wait for the coming promise that is ours?  We may anxiously pace back and forth in the waiting room.  We may continue to say this is some kind of  mistake.  The message of hope and promise could not possibly be for us.  We are not expecting anything.  The message of Christmas was a onetime historical event and we will celebrate what was promised to Mary and that is good enough.  We might refuse to see the light of promise and hope that is within us.  Such denial will not change the fact that the light is growing within us and is just waiting to shine through the windows of our souls and cast out the darkness of the world around us.

We might find ourselves in the waiting room and respond by frantically trying to tie up loose ends or get caught up in the frenzy of others who also claim to be waiting—though they may not realize what is they are waiting for.  They think they are waiting for the “holidays,” for “Santa,” or for Christmas morning when there will be gifts all around.  When you ask them if they are ready there will be a long list of things which still need to be done to get ready.  In spite of logging several hours of shopping on Black Friday and logging on several more times on Cyber Monday, there is still the last minute shopping to be done.   There are cards to get in the mail and the cooking—you are never done with the cookies, the candy and the Christmas dinner.  The awaited news and event is mistaken.  It is thought to be the announcement of yet another holiday door buster sale that is the good news.  Forgotten and missed all together is the news and promise of hope that is growing within each of us.  Forgotten and missed all together is the promise of the coming of light and peace.

How will we spend our time in the waiting room?  In scripture we see silence and withdrawal to be a stance of waiting in response to the promise of the angel.  We saw the silence of Zachariah when he received a promise that was beyond words.  As the first chapter of Luke continues we see the response of Elizabeth.  “For five months she remained in seclusion.”  How many examples do we need?  How many times will we have to see those who received the promise of God respond until we understand how we are to respond?  If we are to hear and comprehend the promise of God to us, if we are to understand God’s dream which is waiting to be born with us, it must found in an enclave of seclusion and silence.  This is a growing challenge as so many around us grow busier and louder as the season of Advent continues.  Yet, we must find a place of silence to reflect and listen, to know that whatever it is that lies within us and whatever light God waits to bring forth from within us it is an awesome work and visitation of God and as such demands and deserves a quiet awareness and concentration.

In this passage we have an interesting meeting.  Two women, both pregnant.  One too old to have a child and one too young.  They meet.

What brings them together?  Kinship?  Yes.  But so much more.  Perhaps it was the mystery with which Mary was trying to cope that drew her to the aged relative.  Perhaps it was the needed seclusion in the face of ridicule and humiliation that was sure to have been the response of her community.  But whatever the pull, they found each other, they comforted each other, rejoiced together, waited together.  They offered to each other hope and to us they offer guidance in our waiting, in our emersion into darkly veiled mystery and the promised hope of the coming light.

From Elizabeth and Mary we find that the best way to spend the time in the waiting room is to do it together with an understanding companion.  Once we realize and come to accept the fact that there is within us a promise and hope it would be easy enough to get caught up in that news.  We could become the center of our own world and expect to be the center of the world of everyone else.  Elizabeth, in her savoring of the understanding of the promise, in her withdraw into seclusion could have refused to make room for the lonely, scared, young Mary.  But, within the seclusion there was space and inclusion for another.  She let the light within herself shine through the windows of her soul to provide a safe place for Mary in her need.  Elizabeth patterns for us how to not get caught up in ourselves in spite of the awareness of our own relationship with God, be it ever so intimate.  Elizabeth proclaims to us the joy that is found in not only allowing others into our sacred space but also in entering into the joy within others.  Elizabeth finds joy as she looks beyond the light and hope she has received and sees that same light and hope in another.  Would you not like to have been in that waiting room?  Two women, one too old to have a child, one too young.  Two women, having received the promise of hope.  Two women, within whom grew the light that would dispel the darkness of their world.  If anything surpassed the individual joy each of these women had in the promise she received it was the compounding of that joy as they celebrated with and for one another.  Together they comforted one another, together they rejoiced, together they waited.

The call of the message is to a two-fold awareness.  One, we must come to the awareness that each and every one of us is pregnant with the presence of God.  The promise and light of hope is within each of us and waits to shine forth from our souls.  We are to ponder and realize what God waits to call forth from us that will proclaim God’s grace, presence and light to dispel the darkness of our world.  And the second is that we must gain an awareness not only of the light and hope in ourselves but we must come to see that promise within others as well.  We must recognize the awaiting potential in others we meet.  We must shelter them, wait with them, offer to share the light within ourselves that may be a strength and comfort to them as they are find themselves shivering in the dark and afraid to go home.  We must believe in them until they can believe in themselves.  We must realize as much joy for the promise of God in others as we have realized in God’s promise for ourselves. God visits us each day in the holy and humble ones we meet along the way.

The call of Advent is to enter an enclave of silence and seclusion that you may come to an awareness of the promise and light within yourself and in that enclave leave space that others may be drawn to you and find in the light shining from the windows of your soul an awareness of the same promise of God in their own lives.