I saw this on my Facebook feed yesterday (thanks, Christy!) and had to share-and-quickblurb.
“What if God said to you: ‘You can be part of my own awesome, immeasurable aims that are bigger than your ability to understand, and you will experience confusion and waiting…OR I can limit my activity in your life to only that which makes sense to you, and your life will feel much simpler. You pick.'” -Gary Morland
Oh, man.
Oh, man.
“Wait gracefully”.
This truth bomb was dropped on my head by Sarah over at Love/Power/Strength in response to a discussion here on my blog, and my ears are still ringing from the impact.
It’s just such a deceptively great phrase! And it applies regardless of what you’re waiting for.
Because there’s so many directions you can take the idea of “graceful”, at least in my mind. And because there’s an alternative: to wait gracelessly. I’ve done my share of that.
What could “wait gracefully” mean?
1. Graceful appearance
The outward appearance of our lives can be staggered, jerky, tumultuous and ungainly, or it can be smooth, tranquil, flowing, and confident – pleasing to the eye.
(Last singleness post for a while.)
There’s a part of me that has struggled to care about God’s love.
You probably know what I mean. We would rather things just go well than be forced to lean on him.
This week is a prime example for singles, especially. Valentine’s Day comes and we singles feel missed, not only by the season but by the church. My church has handled its singles with grace, but not every church does. Irritated by what it perceives as our self-pity, the church swings open its arms with a beatific smile and goes, “Jesus is your boyfriend! Singleness isn’t something to be endured; God’s love is all you need!”
You know they’re right somehow. You feel vaguely guilty. And you do care about God’s love. You do.
But…
“You don’t understand,” some part of you still says. “I’m tired of being alone. I’m sick of the 8,967th article telling me to be content while the church reserves its celebrations for weddings and births. I know you are able, Lord. Wouldn’t it be simpler to just gave me someone?”
Some part of us doesn’t care.
It’s okay to admit that. It’s not like God doesn’t know. Admitting it is the first step to fixing it.
As I’ve opined before, it’s okay to call singleness a legitimate hardship. Doing so diminishes neither singleness nor God. It just reminds us that even comfortable first-world Christians have their disappointments and that God is making us mature, and more fully his, through trial. The mature church should note this and keep striving for a balance of exhortation and empathy, so expertly struck by its Wonderful Counselor.
That said…
It takes little more than a glance at Facebook, or a day at work hearing people’s stories, to see that many Christian singles aren’t happy. Too many don’t know how to get there; too many leap from relationship to relationship, stuff their shelves with romance novels, or just settle into unfruitful funks.
I do not say this in judgment. I used to be full-on funky (not in the 60s way). Over the years, God has slowly gained sweeping victory over this territory of my heart, but it didn’t happen overnight. Every Christian, in some measure, is still somewhere on the trail to a prizing of God’s love above all.
For those still back near the trailhead, I would ask this: have you unknowingly agreed with the lie that God’s love is not enough?
“Here’s the 0-1…this is gonna be a tough play…Bryant!…the Cubs!!!..WIN THE WORLD SERIES!!! Bryant makes the play!! It’s over!! And the Cubs have finally won it all, 8-7 in ten!!”
Joe Buck’s words reverberated across the nation, Chicago erupting into bewildered revelry, a 108-year-old curse shattering into pieces. The Chicago Cubs, known for generations as the “lovable losers” who could find a way to choke in any circumstance, were now the undisputed top dogs – winner of the 2016 World Series.
“No more waiting until next year,” as Buck so eloquently put it – no more next game, no more tough practice session tomorrow, no more drowning in negative headlines. The players could finally let it all go. You could see the worries drop from their shoulders, the internal pressures released. Kris Bryant, having nailed the final toss, leaping across the field like Neil Armstrong on the moon; Anthony Rizzo pocketing that winning ball and flinging his glove aside to leap into a bouncing throng of teammates; fans nationwide collapsing in relief as they watched, their blood pressure dropping just as quickly. Their team…not a newly adopted playoff favorite, but their long-cherished team…had finally won it all.
For me, the most heartwarming moment of the night was watching YouTube videos of elderly folks reveling in their homes. There was none of that when my Seahawks won the Super Bowl; they’re a younger team in a younger sport, no fans in their nineties to watch a lifelong dream come true. That night, ninety-year-olds Cubs fans clapped gleefully like kids from their rocking chairs, their bodies even remembering how to dance for a few moments. They had hung on, disappointment after disappointment, for almost a century. At long last, they had been rewarded.
And thinking of that, I felt…an ache.
It was not the ache of worrying about next season. (By the way, while I have you here – don’t do that. Don’t let your thoughts start turning to whether they’ll repeat next year, to worrying about the draft and free agency, to wondering whether this was all a fluke. Not so soon. They just won the World Series. For goodness’ sake, rest and enjoy it. That’s my advice, from someone whose football team won it all three years ago. Some fans will never know this joy.)
No, this ache was something else.
Yesterday, our youth group discussed faith in action.
The Scripture was from James 2. We discussed how true faith is not created by action, but will create action. If you want a job, you don’t just sit around and pray; you get proactive, take a shower, send out applications and resumes, network. If you want to help the needy, you don’t just sit around and pray; you get creative, volunteer, brainstorm, sacrifice. There’s a part that’s God’s to do, and there’s a part that’s ours; God’s will is a collusion of the two.
I was also careful (after having given a poor impression at first, like I seemingly did above) to tell my teens that prayer in itself is action. We sometimes say of a situation that “All we can do now is pray.” All we can do? That is the greatest possible action! The fact that we resort to prayer after exhausting all our own resources tells us how backwards our view of the world is. Prayer does stuff. If you’re sick, you don’t just lie on the couch and post miserable Facebook memes; you get intercession, call some believers to lay hands on you and pray for your healing, as if you believed James 5:14-15 is actually true(!). Like heat from a flame, real faith will be given away by the action it generates.
But this morning, I got to thinking.
There are times when faith means no action.
Well, October 21, 2015 is here, and the writers of Back to the Future, Part II have let me down.
Despite that movie’s predictions, many things haven’t arrived. No flying cars. No hoverboards. No bionic implants, drone dog-walkers, or Jaws 19, though Star Wars might hit that mark eventually.
You know what else hasn’t arrived?
My wedding day.
Hold the phone – yes, there are men who look forward to that. My brother was one of them. I say “was”, because it’s now past him. How the fat-cheeked rugrat I remember from my childhood grew into a hatchet-faced stud and wooed the perfect match for him, I’ll never know. But he did, and I was his best man Saturday. Good times had by all. (The bride fused the bachelor and bachelorette parties into one laser tag game. You married the right woman, bro.)
And as I sat there during the first dance, fumbling for words for the toast I was to give, a realization hit me: I wasn’t envious that my brother had “escaped” singleness and I had not. I wasn’t sad at all.
It’s probably because my wait has cornered me into another one:
God would have been a fool to give me a wife any sooner.
Brandon J. Adams 