Good morning…
“I don’t know if you get the messages from the chaplains at Lovett,” she wrote yesterday, “but this week’s aligns so beautifully with your waiting season.” My husband is one of the chaplains at The Lovett School, and I have heard him talk about the devotional emails this talented team sends out each week, but I have never experienced the messages myself, until today. Please enjoy with me this wise perspective on the benefits of waiting.
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Act 1 Devotional, January 14, 2019
…the disciples gathered around and asked Jesus, “Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?”
Jesus said to them: “It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”
After he said this, he was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid him from their sight.
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(And) they all joined together constantly in prayer. – Acts 1:6-9,14
For all its spectacular moments, the Bible has a lot of anti-climactic moments as well. For those following along, Jesus just concluded an earthly ministry proclaiming the coming of God’s kingdom, a new reality where all faithful persons find peace, abundance, justice and love. A frightened and violent world had misunderstood him. It had tried to end him. However, he overcame these efforts. He overcame death.
Quite reasonably, the disciples then ask, “Now … finally … now will Israel be restored? Will your kingdom truly come?”
“That’s not for you to know,” Jesus answers. “Just pray. Wait on me. I will send you power enough to witness to my way of life.” And then, poof…he leaves…off into some cloud.
Talk about a letdown. I’m not going to lie. I would have expected a resurrected savior to do a little more.
“When will the kingdom come?” – a question which captures those followers’ deepest longings. What question captures your deepest longings these days?
When will our government get its act together?
When will the mudslinging stop?
When will the violence end?
When will my loved one(s) feel better?
When will the stress ease up?
When will she be happier?
When will he be happier?
When will I?
When will life be all I want it to be?
“When will this change?” we might ask Jesus.
“This is not for you to know,” he answers still. Just pray. Wait on me. I will send you power enough to witness to my way of life.
Here is our challenge: to do our best to change our world and lives for the better, but not fixate on things outside of our control. We are to keep our focus on the one part of our world we can control, albeit imperfectly: ourselves. Pray to God. Rest in God. Routinely, regularly, ask God to help us live out the values of his kingdom in our own lives even if all the world can’t quite yet. Then, to the best of our abilities, live those values. When we do that, though those biggest questions and deepest longings still remain, we find a measure of peace. We find a little bit of power, power enough to witness to a better way of life.
Rev. Wade Reck
Middle School Chaplain
The Lovett School
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A wise, wise perspective on waiting, I would say. It is not for us to know the times or dates the Father has set by His own authority. The “when” is out of our control, but the “what” is ours to receive. We will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on us, and we will be witnesses, watching and waiting, as our God restores everything. In His time. In His way.
He has made everything beautiful and appropriate in its time. He has also planted eternity [a sense of divine purpose] in the human heart [a mysterious longing which nothing under the sun can satisfy, except God]—yet man cannot find out (comprehend, grasp) what God has done (His overall plan) from the beginning to the end (Ecclesiastes 3:11, AMP).
…Sue…
