Live Expectantly

Last updated on: December 5, 2016 at 9:04 am by Marilyn McEntyre

Live Expectantly 2016-12-05T09:04:38-07:00 Marilyn McEntyre

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We live in an unfolding story. The plot thickens and turns. If we look back, we can see patterns emerging—themes, intersections, loops, paths not taken. The mystery and paradox of Advent lie in its emphasis on expectation: believers wait in “sure and certain hope” that what has happened will happen. What has been true will be true again, new every year, yet still to come, fact and promise. We live, as theologian Karl Barth put it, in the “already but not yet.” In cold, candle-lit churches people gather and sing, “Come, thou long-expected Jesus,” remembering an ancient birth, awaiting a new one, hoping against hope.

The word expect took an interesting turn in its journey from first-century Latin to 21st century English: before 1600 it was commonly used to mean “wait” or “defer action.” Only later did it acquire its current meaning of “await” or “desire, hope, long for, look for with anticipation.” Vestiges of the older meaning make the word a kind of palimpsest—a reused manuscript on which traces of earlier inscription remain. To live expectantly is to live in hope—even in longing—but also to wait patiently for what will happen in due time. Or, to put it biblically, “in the fullness of time.”

Expectation as a state of mind and spirit is not only a large, eschatological idea; it may also be a daily practice and habit of mind. To live expectantly is to know something is afoot. The Spirit who watches over, broods and guides and blows where it will may any moment show up or show forth. If we are willing to notice, we will notice how apparent coincidences, unplanned encounters, and even obstacles work as invitations or nudges or reminders or directives.

It is possible to live expectantly without insisting on or even naming what we expect. It is possible to “look for with anticipation” without a particular object in mind, like a child without a Christmas list (a dwindling remnant) for whom the unopened package promises utter surprise. Simply to expect that we will be given what we need for our growth, that we will be invited again and again to awaken, pay attention, learn, stretch into love in new ways, practice discernment, exercise generosity, or rest and be held, is a rich and joyous way of life.

T.S. Eliot’s mysterious admonishment in “Little Gidding,” “…wait without hope / For hope would be hope for the wrong thing,” cautions against fixing our hopes on objects of our own feeble imagining rather than waiting, hoping, and expecting an end to the unfolding story, or the next plot twist, that we cannot fully imagine. Despite the hard political facts, despite ecological and economic anxieties, we can take heart in the habit of expectation–that there will be a new heaven and a new earth, that help will come for us all, trailing “clouds of glory,” and that the day will offer gifts and surprises and answers to questions we didn’t know to ask.

(image: John McEntyre, “Resonance 1”)

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