Sermons for the Month
What To Do While Waiting For God To Act
DATE: May 23rd, 2004
SERVICE: The Ascension of Our Lord
TEXT: Acts 1:1-11“To all of you Saints here this morning, grace and peace to you from God our Father, from His Son, Jesus Christ and His Holy Spirit. AMEN
Waiting is something that many of us do not do well. And, waiting for God to act can be particularly challenging. In today's reading from Acts we go back to the beginning. For five weeks now we've been focusing on the establishment of the Christian church. Today we are reminded that it all - the bold proclamations, the baptisms, the healings, the dreams and visions that opened up the ministry to all people - began with a time of waiting.
I love the picture that is painted in the story of the Ascension in the first chapter of Acts, particularly the ending. The followers of Jesus, men and women who love the Lord, are standing around, mouths open, gazing up into the heavens when two angelic beings appear. They confront the crowd with these words, "Why do you stand looking up toward heaven?"
I've always thought that someone surely must have spoken up to answer that question, unless they were so much in shock that they were speechless. "What do you mean?" a disciple might have said, "It's obvious why we are standing here looking up into the heavens. Jesus, our teacher, our Lord, the one who died on the cross and was raised from the dead, just left us. For 40 days now he has been revealing himself to us, helping us grasp all that has happened.
"We thought that at any moment he would restore the Kingdom of Israel, give us back our homeland. But now he's gone … gone up into the clouds. What are we supposed to do next? Jesus said we should go out into the world and be his witnesses. But not sooner did those words get out of his mouth than he told us not to go … at least not yet. He said we had to wait for what he called the Holy Spirit to come upon us."
Let me interject here the fact that before his crucifixion Jesus had talked with his followers about the Holy Spirit. In John 14 he called the Spirit the Advocate, the one who would teach them everything and remind them of all that he had said and done. This Holy Spirit will fill them with a profound sense of peace, will guide them, and will empower them to testify to the truth, Jesus said. They are to wait, stay put, until the Spirit arrives.
"But when will that happen? How long must we wait?" That, in part, must have been what they were thinking as they gazed up into the heavens after Jesus disappeared into the clouds. What does one do while waiting for God to act?
I'm not especially good at waiting, at least when it comes to anything related to me personally. Oh, I've done a lot of waiting in my life. In my younger years I spent a lot of time in hospitals waiting with family members. Due to family emergencies I waited to go away to college and I waited to interview for my first call as a pastor.
Then, once a pastor, I've waited with people before surgery, during surgery, in emergency rooms and even in court rooms. When I was the pastor in a large Long Term Care setting we tried very hard to make sure that no one died alone, so I spent many quiet hours waiting for the transition from this life to the next. God has blessed me with a sense of peace as I wait with others.
I'm not sure, though, how I would do if the waiting was about me personally rather than a family or congregation member. I've been fortunate not to have had much experience with that … at least not yet. I do remember one experience, though, that is a good illustration of why waiting is so hard.
Two years ago when I went to Bolivia I found myself in a situation in which I could do nothing but wait. My friend and I were flying between Santa Cruz and Cochabamba when the flight attendance became very intense. They began moving people from seats by exits, taking their places, looking grim. I thought to myself, "This is not a good sign." Then, the plane began to dip and a voice came over the loud speaker. The instructions were, of course, in Spanish.
During that time in Bolivia I had regained much of my ability to understand Spanish, but only if people spoke slowly and clearly. That certainly was not the case on that plane. My friend is more fluent than I and was straining to understand the announcement as well as seeking clarification from our seatmate.
People around us were obviously agitated. I, of course, felt totally out of control. I could not understand what was happening. I could not get up and fix it. And every time I sought information from my friend I was told to wait. Wait! What do you mean, wait? It seemed intolerable. But there was nothing I could do but just that … wait.
Finally I learned that the plane was experiencing mechanical problems and we were turning around and returning to the airport in Santa Cruz. I also learned that this was not an unusual occurrence on Bolivian airlines.
As I look back on that experience I realize that it illustrates exactly what we feel when we have to wait, especially when we are waiting for God to act. We don't understand what is happening. We want information. We want to do something … to fix the problem. We feel out of control. And yet, we must wait.
I would not be at all surprised all that is what the followers of Jesus were feeling that day as Jesus left them, ascending into heaven. Perhaps they wanted to yell, "Wait! What do you mean, wait?" Yet … for the sake of the mission … that's what they had to do.
It's interesting, thought, what they did do while they waited … and it's informative. We don't often read on past verse 11 in Acts 1, so let me share that passage with you.
"Then they returned to Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet, which is near Jerusalem, a Sabbath day's journey away. When they had entered the city, they went to the room upstairs where they were staying, Peter, and John, and James, and Andrew, Philip and Thomas, Bartholomew and Matthew, James son of Alphaeus, and Simon the Zealot, and Judas son of James. All these were constantly devoting themselves to prayer, together with certain women, including Mary the mother of Jesus, as well as his brothers."
Did you catch that? They were constantly devoting themselves to prayer, gathered together with other believers. That's what they did while they waited. In our complicated world that may sound just too simple.
Sometimes it seems to me that our world has become so challenging because we have lost track of the most basic truths. We want quick fixes if, heaven forbid, we ever feel anything uncomfortable or face the unknown. The internet fills our lives with information, e-mail and cell phones keep us in constant communication, there are pills and tonics (both legal and illegal) to cure or cover every discomfort, and chemicals and procedures to fix every flaw.
The thing is, though, that even all this is not enough and life still is often beyond our ability to manage and control. We find ourselves on that airplane, so to speak, not comprehending what's happening and not being able to do anything about it.
What can we do while we wait? We can pray. We too can find support among the faithful. And, as amazing as it seems, because that's all we can do it will be enough. God will act. As was true for the first followers of Jesus, we will be given what we need to take the next step, and to face what the future brings.
Waiting is hard. So the simple but word for today is this…support one another and pray...and allow God to be God. AMEN