Wasting Time Waiting

The Christian Church is currently in the middle of its Advent season, and ‘waiting’ is the key theme of this liturgical season. Christians are a people who are waiting. But for many, waiting is often a time of tedium, even boredom, a time of uncertainty, and perhaps even anxiety. We can become very impatient with waiting.

However, one way to think of Advent is to liken it to a pregnancy. A spiritual writer once wrote: ‘Waiting is an impractical time to our way of thinking. It’s good for nothing, but mysteriously necessary to all that is coming. As in pregnancy, nothing of value comes into being without a period of quiet incubation. Not a healthy baby, not a loving relationship, not a reconciliation, not a work of art, and never a human transformation. Brewing, baking, simmering, fermenting, ripening, germinating, gestating, are all processes of becoming, and they all demand a period of waiting.’

I have always thought that for those of us on the spiritual path, this season just before Christmas is a time set aside so that we can see with renewed and transformed minds, which is what repentance (the Greek word metanoia) actually means. To possess a renewed and transformed mind, is to have literally turned around our old thoughts and old ways.

There are always many things that constantly demanding our attention. But during this season of waiting, I believe it is a good time for all of us to look again at our lives and how we spend our time. Looking back over his many years in prison, Nelson Mandela had this to say: ‘There is no prospect about prison which pleases – with the possible exception of one. One has time to think. In the vortex of the struggle, which one is constantly reacting to changing circumstances, one rarely has the chance to consider carefully all the ramifications of one’s decisions and policies. Prison provided the time… to reflect on what one had done and not done.’

I suggest ‘wasting time waiting’ is an important part of the Christian call to prepare a way for the Lord this Christmas.