Have you ever been on hold? A professionally cadenced voice answers after a few rings with a polite, "Please hold until a representative is available to assist you." Then tinny music (my family would put the word "music" in quotes) crackles loudly over miles of cable setting your leg jiggling or fingers drumming in annoyance and impatience. You try to find something to fill the time but don't want your mind to wander too far from the object of your phone call lest you be caught unready to handle business when the overworked customer service agent picks up your line.
Life sometimes has periods much like this telephone hold. Undesired times of waiting, somewhat annoying, bringing a sense of wasted time to our accomplishment oriented spirits. Yet these holds are necessary to complete the great task slated for us. As I have been reflecting on the last eight years of my life, this idea of being on hold seems an apt analogy. Life up to February of 2014 was full, bustling, full of productivity (and yes, hard, because illness was creeping up on me). Bread baking was my profession. Bringing the love of Christ to the hurting of the world was my passion. Discipling younger women was my satisfaction. Family grocery shopping and mothering my aging yet perpetually young aunt who was graced with an extra chromosome was my loved duty. And then all that came to an abrupt end with two emergency room visits, a brush with "the valley of the shadow of death," and endless diagnoses. Cue the long hold, nerves grated by the ugly realities of an illness ravaged body, impatience with a multitude of questions as yet unanswered, and uncertainty how to steward this unspecified length of time. And yet I have a deep sense that this is a critical holding period, the waiting room into a greater future. The many injunctions in the Bible calling me to wait on the Lord hold my soul secure. "I remain confident of this: I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord." (Psalm 27:13-14).
Are you waiting? Waiting for an answer? Waiting for a promise to be fulfilled? Waiting for hope to dawn? Waiting...? Hold the phone. An answer is on the way. The One who can satisfy all your longings is worth waiting for.
"...wait for the LORD, and he will deliver you" (Proverbs 20:22).
Life sometimes has periods much like this telephone hold. Undesired times of waiting, somewhat annoying, bringing a sense of wasted time to our accomplishment oriented spirits. Yet these holds are necessary to complete the great task slated for us. As I have been reflecting on the last eight years of my life, this idea of being on hold seems an apt analogy. Life up to February of 2014 was full, bustling, full of productivity (and yes, hard, because illness was creeping up on me). Bread baking was my profession. Bringing the love of Christ to the hurting of the world was my passion. Discipling younger women was my satisfaction. Family grocery shopping and mothering my aging yet perpetually young aunt who was graced with an extra chromosome was my loved duty. And then all that came to an abrupt end with two emergency room visits, a brush with "the valley of the shadow of death," and endless diagnoses. Cue the long hold, nerves grated by the ugly realities of an illness ravaged body, impatience with a multitude of questions as yet unanswered, and uncertainty how to steward this unspecified length of time. And yet I have a deep sense that this is a critical holding period, the waiting room into a greater future. The many injunctions in the Bible calling me to wait on the Lord hold my soul secure. "I remain confident of this: I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord." (Psalm 27:13-14).
Are you waiting? Waiting for an answer? Waiting for a promise to be fulfilled? Waiting for hope to dawn? Waiting...? Hold the phone. An answer is on the way. The One who can satisfy all your longings is worth waiting for.
"...wait for the LORD, and he will deliver you" (Proverbs 20:22).
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