Be PATIENT !!#&#

Advent Day 5

First Thursday in Advent

December 1, 2011

Reading: James 5:7–8 (NRSV)

⁷ Be patient, therefore, beloved, until the coming of the Lord. The farmer waits for the precious crop from the earth, being patient with it until it receives the early and the late rains. ⁸ You also must be patient. Strengthen your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is near.

Theme: Be Patient!

Reflection:

In our rush, hurry and get it done now culture, the words “Be Patient!” are likely to put many in people into a slow—no make that fast—burn. In the 21^st century patience is a highly underutilized talent. Baby boomers grew up with instant cereal, instant coffee and instant pudding, along with fast food, but we still depended on letters as a primary form of communication. Remember when a long distance phone call was a rarity; it was usually announced with “they’re calling LONG DISTANCE”! Our children’s children know a world of instant communications of both words and images, web-streamed movies, on-line purchasing, and electronic banking. Patience means having to wait because a company’s website is responding slowly with an overload of Black Friday purchasing.

In Advent we are called to be patient as we watch and wait for the coming of Christ. This patient watching and waiting can be interpreted on many levels. For children, the watching and waiting is the interminable December time until Christmas. We can hope that our children are watching and waiting for Jesus to be born, but undoubtedly there is at least a bit of waiting for Santa! We also watch and wait for signs of Jesus’ presence in our own lives. This requires patience and attentive watching, as we never know when we will get a glimpse of God’s Kingdom in our own lives.

As adults, we also know that we are watching and waiting for Jesus to return. This requires extremely patient, faithful waiting, as people have been waiting for two millennia for Jesus to return. When James wrote these words to the Jewish Christians during the first century, people expected Jesus to return within their lifetimes. We however, have 2000 years of perspective in realizing that Jesus may not return in our lifetimes, but then again, we can’t know the time or the place. We know Jesus will return because God has promised it, but we don’t know the when, where or how. This waiting requires much more patience than that possessed by those of us who live in this time of instant gratification.

Prayer: Patient and loving God, grant me the faith to believe and the patience to wait for the coming of your son and our Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen