Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Home
Progressive Christian
Waiting

Waiting

Last updated on: May 11, 2010 at 10:24 am by Guest Contributor

53 Comments

Waiting 2010-05-11T10:24:37+00:00 Guest Contributor

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

When I first finished divinity school, I subscribed to a journal of Christian spirituality called Weavings. That was when I first heard of the concept of “active waiting.” Often associated with the liturgical seasons of Lent and Advent, “active waiting” describes the way in which believers wait for a great spiritual event. In the Christian tradition, this spiritual event is often associated with Jesus: waiting for Jesus’ birth; waiting for the second coming of Christ; waiting for the crucifixion and resurrection; waiting for Jesus to be revealed; waiting for the Holy Spirit to come.

In the days and weeks after the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus, the disciples are often portrayed as waiting. I am fascinated by Luke’s way of recounting this. The disciples have interacted with a risen Jesus. They have broken bread with him. They are talking amongst each other. Jesus appears again, speaks some words of wisdom and concludes with these words: “And see I am sending upon you what God promised; so stay here in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high.” (Luke 24:49) Then Jesus walks a ways with the disciples and, as the tradition names it, ascends into heaven.

While there is rich theological material to explore about whether or not Jesus ascended into heaven or not, and whether resurrection is heavenly or earth, bodily or metaphorical, what really captures my attention is the way the disciples are told to wait.

Stay here

Stay here until

Stay here until the power comes

Wait

Just wait

So they wait. They go to the city and wait. But, the scripture goes on to say, the disciples don’t sit around twiddling their thumbs. Rather, they go to the temple and worship and praise God continually. They wait actively.

The great priest and author, Henri Nouwen, says that waiting in scripture is not like waiting for a late bus. He writes:

“Those who are waiting are waiting very actively. They know what they are waiting for is growing from the ground on which they are standing . . . That’s the secret. The secret of waiting is the faith that the seed has been planted, that something has begun. Active waiting means to be present fully to the moment in the conviction that something is happening where you are and that you want to be present to it . . . Waiting, then, is not passive.”

Spiritual leaders often use this concept of active waiting to help us to develop the spiritual art of patience. We should practice waiting with prayer and worship and spiritual disciplines. Because, they say, we trust that Jesus will be born, that the Holy Spirit will come, that Christ will return. The liturgical seasons of Lent and Advent remind us to ritually practice waiting for God and trusting in God’s promises

Contemporary society is often accused of being bad at waiting. We’re impatient. We’ve become accustomed to a greater level of immediate gratification than previous generations. Technology facilitates this. We are able to Google information we want. We have 24-hour news cycles. Media images flash by quickly. We don’t have to wait in the ways that previous generations waited. We’re not even accustomed to waiting.

There’s a lot of waiting that occurs in the lives of people who live with depression. In between the desire to be well, and the end of the commercial where the woman runs through the sunny field with a kite and happy children . . . is a lot of waiting. We wait to feel better. We wait to get better.

One of the worst waitings is the season when one waits for medication to work. Psychiatrists will often say that it takes about six weeks to begin to feel the effects of psychotropic medications. And so we have to be patient. We can’t expect to feel better immediately.

This is a tortuous kind of waiting. After all the time of desperate illness, after finally deciding to be well, after finding a doctor you can afford, get to, and who seems to understand what you’re going through (which is another post all in itself), you’re given medication and told – it should start to kick in in, say, six weeks. Could anything be crueler?

In my life, this kind of waiting has an active component as well. Waiting for medication to work is figuring out how strong to steep ginger in tea to cut the incessant nausea of the new pills. Waiting is lying very still on the couch because walking from one room to another in my small apartment makes me dizzy. Waiting is making bland foods with lots of nutrition because I vomit everything spicy and tasty for two weeks. Waiting is driving on curbs and parking at an angle for weeks until I realize that the medication affected my vision and that was somewhere in the 2 sheets of fine print I received from the pharmacist. Waiting is taking the other pill to get rid of the anxiety caused by the pill that is supposed to make me happy. Waiting is calling the doctor back after declaring I can take it no more, and picking another drug, and going to the pharmacist and trying it all over again.

This is the unseen active waiting for many people who live with mental health challenges. Waiting for health. Waiting for happiness. Waiting for the holy spirit of wellness. Waiting for a change to come.

Sometimes I wonder if the Christian tradition hasn’t sanitized the disciples’ active waiting. I wonder if the gospel writers made the disciples more patient and pious because the writers knew the end of the story. (After all, when the early Christians find themselves waiting for the second coming of Jesus far longer than they expected, we get more stories of impatience and frustration.) I wonder if the disciples weren’t as anxious and scared and tired as depressed folk can be when waiting for medication to work. I wonder if our religious faith might not feel more accessible if we told that story.

I’m not suggesting that we shouldn’t try to cultivate patience, or that spiritual practices are to be eschewed. Prayer and worship are good things. But, today, I’m not willing to glorify waiting either. Sometimes waiting sucks. Sometimes waiting feels horrible. Sometimes waiting seems like a harsh penalty meted out to someone who has finally admitted what’s wrong, and finally found a doctor. Asking someone to wait seems unkind to ask of someone who has finally found faith.

This may be a truism of faith: that there’s a lot of painful waiting involved. This may also be the only short cut to waiting for medication to work: faith. I’ve never heard a doctor say it this way, but they’re asking you to have faith in the pill. Have faith that it will work eventually. Have faith that if this one doesn’t work, then they will find another one that will. Have faith in the process of feeling crappy before you feel better.

Monica A. Coleman is Associate Professor of Constructive Theology and African American Religions and Co-Director of the Center for Process Studies at Claremont School of Theology in southern California. She blogs at Beautiful Mind Blog.

Uncategorized

Previous Post

May 10, 2010

Garbage into Gold

Next Post

May 11, 2010 Star Wars Opening Crawl

Recent Comments

53 Comments | Leave a Comment

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Advent Author Interviews Battle Over the Body and Blood of Christ Bearing Beauty Book Reviews Christian Education christian spirituallity christianity Christmas Church Church Leadership Contemplation Creation Care Death and Dying Death Penalty Disruptive Change Disruptors Series Easter Education Evolution and Faith Future of Progressive Christianity Gun Violence Health & Wellness Holy Week Interfaith Israel-Palestine Leading Differently Lent LGBTQ Living with Cancer Meditations on the Cross Mental Illness millennials Mimetic Mondays Monday Meditations Movie Reviews New Monasticism Pando Populus Parenting Patheos 10+1 Q&A Series PC(USA) Politics Pop Culture Practical Theology Series Prayer progressive christian Race Relations Reformation religion Religion and Politics Religion in America Rethink Church Social Justice Spirituality Spirituality of the Body Stump a Scholar Technology and Faith Thanksgiving Theodicy Trust Me Church Uncategorized Why I'm Still Christian Youth Ministry

Select a Month December 2025 April 2025 January 2025 September 2023 September 2022 May 2022 February 2022 January 2022 November 2021 October 2021 May 2021 February 2021 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 June 2020 May 2020 March 2020 June 2019 March 2019 January 2019 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012 April 2012 March 2012 February 2012 January 2012 December 2011 November 2011 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011 July 2011 June 2011 May 2011 April 2011 March 2011 February 2011 January 2011 December 2010 November 2010 October 2010 September 2010 August 2010 July 2010 June 2010 May 2010 April 2010 March 2010

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

What city did Jesus grow up in?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Capernaum Nazareth Bethlehem Jericho