Praise the Lord for the season of
waiting. . . the season of longing. . . the season of expectations. "O come O
come Emmanuel". "Come Thou Long-Expected Jesus". As we wait in Christ we have
the "sure and certain hope". This hope does not disappoint us. The
long-expected Jesus came in the "fullness" of time and He will come in Glory and
splendor in His time.
Samuel Beckett’s play, entitled
"Waiting for Godot", is a satire on the human condition. As Beckett sees
it, humanity is waiting for Godot, or God, to come and save them, but he never
shows up. Their waiting is in vain, for although they have been repeatedly told
that God is coming, he never has, and never will. The characters in the play
are told to wait for Godot, for he might come tomorrow. So they continue to
wait in their dreary existence. The only prop in the play is a dead tree. The
implication in all this is that there is no God and no Savior. Life, according
to Beckett and his fellow Existentialists, is absurd. There is no ultimate
meaning to existence, and so we have to create our own meaning, without
artificial props like a belief in God. The tradition of God coming to earth to
save humankind is very strong so that it pervades our thoughts and
conversations. Beckett wants to dismantle this belief for us. He believes that
many people live their whole lives waiting for God to show up, but their waiting
is in vain.
However, the futility of life apart from God is more than evident in the play. The characters are pathetic and they contemplate suicide several times, even though they cannot even find the emotional energy to carry it out. For people like Samuel Beckett all this talk of waiting in hope is foolishness. God is not going to show up. We have been deceived, so what we should do is stop expecting God to show up. That way we won’t be disappointed when he fails to make the scene. Interestingly enough, Beckett wants people to give up waiting on God, but he never offers anything in its place except despair. Some people become apathetic as the wait goes on. They don’t care anymore. Some lose faith. Some become bitter, angry and hostile toward God.
None of this is new. The apostle Peter wrote to the people of God saying, “First of all, you must understand that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and following their own evil desires. They will say, ‘Where is this “coming” he promised? Ever since our fathers died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation.’ They deliberately forget that long ago by God’s word the heavens existed and the earth was formed out of water and by water. By these waters also the world of that time was deluged and destroyed. By the same word the present heavens and earth are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men. Let us not, however, forget this one thing: "With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. . . The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything in it will be laid bare." Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought we to be? We ought to live holy and godly lives as we look forward to the day of God and speed its coming. That day will bring about the destruction of the heavens by fire, and the elements will melt in the heat” (2 Peter 3:3-12).
There will always be those who believe it is futile to wait for God, but they deliberately forget that he has already come. He came to the Garden of Eden. He came in the person of Jesus, and he will come again. In fact, God comes to us many times throughout our lives if our hearts are receptive and our eyes are open.
However, the futility of life apart from God is more than evident in the play. The characters are pathetic and they contemplate suicide several times, even though they cannot even find the emotional energy to carry it out. For people like Samuel Beckett all this talk of waiting in hope is foolishness. God is not going to show up. We have been deceived, so what we should do is stop expecting God to show up. That way we won’t be disappointed when he fails to make the scene. Interestingly enough, Beckett wants people to give up waiting on God, but he never offers anything in its place except despair. Some people become apathetic as the wait goes on. They don’t care anymore. Some lose faith. Some become bitter, angry and hostile toward God.
None of this is new. The apostle Peter wrote to the people of God saying, “First of all, you must understand that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and following their own evil desires. They will say, ‘Where is this “coming” he promised? Ever since our fathers died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation.’ They deliberately forget that long ago by God’s word the heavens existed and the earth was formed out of water and by water. By these waters also the world of that time was deluged and destroyed. By the same word the present heavens and earth are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men. Let us not, however, forget this one thing: "With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. . . The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything in it will be laid bare." Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought we to be? We ought to live holy and godly lives as we look forward to the day of God and speed its coming. That day will bring about the destruction of the heavens by fire, and the elements will melt in the heat” (2 Peter 3:3-12).
There will always be those who believe it is futile to wait for God, but they deliberately forget that he has already come. He came to the Garden of Eden. He came in the person of Jesus, and he will come again. In fact, God comes to us many times throughout our lives if our hearts are receptive and our eyes are open.
Henri Nouwen wrote a book called
"Sabbatical Journeys", in which he wrote about some of his friends who
were trapeze artists, called the Flying Roudellas. They told Nouwen that there
is a special relationship between the flyer and the catcher on the trapeze.
This relationship is governed by important rules, such as “The flyer is the one
who lets go, and the catcher is the one who catches.” As the flyer swings on
the trapeze high above the crowd, the moment comes when he must let go. He
flings his body out in mid-air. His job is to keep flying and wait for the
strong hands of the catcher to take hold of him at just the right moment. One
of the Flying Roudellas told Nouwen, “The flyer must never try to catch the
catcher.” The flyer’s job is to wait in absolute trust. The catcher will catch
him, but he must wait."
Nouwen wrote, “Waiting is a period of learning. The longer we wait, the more we hear about him for whom we are waiting.” Waiting is not a static state; it is a time when God is working behind the scenes, and the primary focus of his work is on us.
Nouwen wrote, “Waiting is a period of learning. The longer we wait, the more we hear about him for whom we are waiting.” Waiting is not a static state; it is a time when God is working behind the scenes, and the primary focus of his work is on us.
I love Eugene Peterson’s paraphrase
of Romans 8:24: “Waiting does not diminish us, any more than waiting diminishes a
pregnant mother. We are enlarged in the waiting” (The
Message). We wait
expectantly. God is busy bringing about his full plan for the world and for
us. In his perfect timing he will birth that plan. The Bible says, “But when
the time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman” (Galatians 4:4). Before it was time, the birth of Christ would have been
premature, but when the time came, nothing could hold him back. When it is time
for Christ to return, nothing will be able to hold him back.
In Jesus .
Brown
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