Waiting Room

Introduction

Good morning, my name is Ryan Hanson and I serve as a member of the preaching team here at Encounter.

The last few months of navigating social distancing and the “stay home, stay safe” order has been hard on me.  I have to admit, I am tired.  I was encouraged at first by the shift in my Facebook wall from political rhetoric to a seemingly united “we’ll get through this” stance.  As quarantine went on, that optimism faded as the hate crept back in as people started going after leadership for decisions they didn’t agree with.  I’m tired of seeing this country divided so harshly by politics.  The last few weeks, in the wake of the murder of Ahmaud Arbery, the Amy Cooper 911 call, and the murder of George Floyd, I'm tired of seeing minorities continue to be treated unjustly in society. I'm tired of waiting for things to get better, just to see them continue to get worse.

Are you tired? I’d love to hear your experience through this period in history we find ourselves in.  Please use the comments of this stream.  Join the conversation.

Over the past three weeks, Dirk has done a great job of walking us through three stories in the Bible that showed us how to wait.  Habakkuk showing us that God sometimes forces us to wait.  Through Judas we learned how greed and impatience waste an opportunity to let God work on us through the waiting.  Last week we saw how David chose to wait on God’s timing and let God prepare him for future battles while he waited.

Today I want to talk about what God calls us to do when we get tired of waiting.

I think there are a few lenses we typically look through when we get tired of waiting.

I’ve been reading a lot of books with my 6 year old daughter and a few of them have lessons on waiting.  Piggie and Gerald spends 57 pages with Gerald impatiently waiting on a surprise from Piggie.  They spend all day waiting, doing nothing, while Gerald complains, gives up, comes back, and finally sees the stars at night (the big surprise), and says “waiting is not easy, but worth it”.  Is this what we’re supposed to do when we wait?  Are we supposed to do nothing, silently sucking up the discomfort of not knowing when the waiting will end?

Daniel Tiger (a spinoff of Mr. Rogers) has a different lens.  When he has to wait, his mom teaches him a song, “When You Wait You Can Play, Sing, or Imagine Anything”.  When we wait, are we supposed to keep ourselves quietly occupied with the goal of not bothering anyone else?

I know what you’re thinking, “children’s lessons are overly simplified”, but what strikes me is that the lens I’ve developed is no better.  For me, somewhere along the way I picked up this quote

“If not you, who?  If not now, when?” Hillel the Elder

This is credited to Hillel the Elder, who was the founder of the House of Hillel, one of the two main rabbinic schools at the time of Jesus.  He was also the grandfather of Gamaliel (the Rabbi that taught Paul who wrote ½ the New Testament).  I always felt pretty justified in using this quote because of the author.  But is waiting simply the process of looking for the first opportunity to act and taking it?

From my experience all these lenses fall short.  Waiting is not silently sucking up the discomfort of the unknown, it is not keeping ourselves occupied in an effort not to bother other people, and it is not continually looking for first opportunity to act and taking it.

Today I want to look through God’s lens on waiting,

What does God want us to do when we want to wait faithfully like David, but get impatient like Judas?

To answer this question, I want to look at the story of Abraham and Sarah.  For me this is one of those stories that resonate.  When I read it, I feel like God wrote it just for me.  The waiting that Abraham and Sarah were called to parallels the waiting I went through during a significant period in my life.  As we read through Abraham and Sarah’s story, I’d like your permission to share a little about my story as well, to show how God helped me understand how to wait even when greed and impatience creep in.  Let’s jump in.  Please turn with me to Genesis 12.

Body

Promise

The story of Abraham and Sarah starts when God gives Abraham a promise.  At this point in their lives, Abraham and Sarah are 75 years old, and have no children, which is a HUGE problem for a married couple in the ancient world.  For context, not having a child in the ancient world was looked upon as a punishment from God for a sinful life, so it is safe to assume that they were not treated well by the community.  Let’s join Abraham and Sarah in Genesis 12:1-3.  It says…

Genesis 12:1–4 NIV

The Lord had said to Abram, “Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you. “I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.” So Abram went, as the Lord had told him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he set out from Harran.

Abraham had the gift of hearing a promise directly from God.  He knew exactly what God was going to do in his life.  God was going to make him into a great nation, which implied giving him children.  Abraham acted as one would expect, he jumped at the promise of a family, and left.

My story starts less dramatically.  God didn’t speak to me audibly (never has), but did give me a clear vision of what he called me to.  You see back in 1998 God opened the door for me to start coaching hockey.  I coached middle school hockey for 15 years.  At the same time, God opened the door for me to volunteer with the middle school ministry at church.  Through those experiences, God showed me the full range of environments that kids experience.  God opened my eyes to the struggle and suffering of kids in my own city, and grew my heart for them.  A few years into volunteering I felt a very clear prompting from the Holy Spirit that God wanted me to be a foster parent and show unconditional love to the kids that need it the most.  I was single at the time, in college, and had no way of doing that, so I knew I would have to wait, but the vison and the promise was there.

Tired of Waiting

Please notice, neither Abraham nor I got timeframes on our promises.  You’re probably thinking the same thing I was.  What good is a promise if there is no timeframe attached? How can you wait well if you don’t know how long you’re being asked to wait?  At what point do you quit waiting?  Abraham was feeling much the way we would and by Genesis 15, Abraham was getting tired of waiting and starting to have doubts.  Let’s see what he did starting in Genesis 15:2-3.

Genesis 15:2–4 NIV

But Abram said, “Sovereign Lord, what can you give me since I remain childless and the one who will inherit my estate is Eliezer of Damascus?” And Abram said, “You have given me no children; so a servant in my household will be my heir.” Then the word of the Lord came to him: “This man will not be your heir, but a son who is your own flesh and blood will be your heir.”

Abraham is not only tired of waiting but he has given up and come up with his own plan to establish an heir.  To our 21st century ears, it sounds odd to adopt an adult male as an heir, but it was common practice in the ancient world, so this would have been a very logical thing for Abraham to do.  But in Genesis 15:4, God responded to Abraham’s plan and told him not to adopt his servant and reaffirmed his promise that he would have a child of his own.

As we continue in the story, Sarah starts to get tired of waiting and came up with a plan of her own.  In Genesis 16:1-4a it says

Genesis 16:1–4 NIV

Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children. But she had an Egyptian slave named Hagar; so she said to Abram, “The Lord has kept me from having children. Go, sleep with my slave; perhaps I can build a family through her.” Abram agreed to what Sarai said. So after Abram had been living in Canaan ten years, Sarai his wife took her Egyptian slave Hagar and gave her to her husband to be his wife. He slept with Hagar, and she conceived. When she knew she was pregnant, she began to despise her mistress.

Please notice, 10 years had passed since God’s original promise to Abraham.  I’m not sure how you look at Sarah’s plan, but I read it and think it is awful.  In reality, in the ancient world this was very common.  Marriage contracts had built into them three options available to the husband if the wife could not produce an heir within 10 years.  The husband could divorce the wife and marry someone else, the husband could get a 2nd wife, or the husband could get a child through a servant / slave acting as a surrogate.  Looking out for her best interest Sarah offered the option that best served her.  She could stay the only wife and get a child out of the deal.  After 10 years of waiting, Sarah and Abraham decided it was time to exercise those rights and get a child though the legal options available to them. They stopped waiting on God.

I want to pause here.  Notice the difference in how Abraham and Sarah approached their impatience.  Abraham had a plan, brought it to God, was shot down, and didn’t go through with it.  Sarah had a plan, went to Abraham, neither went to God, and they went forward blindly.

Who do you go to for guidance when the right answer isn’t clear?

Who are you allowing to speak into your lives?  Who are you listening to that may be leading you down the wrong path?  Are you giving people authority over your decisions that only God should have?

Abraham and Sarah screwed up and stopped waiting on God.  In my story, I didn’t do any better.  I got married at age 29, almost 10 years after knowing that God wanted me to be a foster parent.  Two years into my marriage the church we attended did a whole series on justice and worked in the need for foster parents into one of the sermons.  I saw it as a sign that this was my moment.  I was done waiting.  My wife and I prayed about it, and didn’t get the direct “NO” that Abraham got from God, but didn’t get a “YES” either.  My wife, wisely, thought that we should have some experience in parenting before trying to parent a higher needs child.  Friends and relatives all said this was not something we were prepared for.  Since I didn’t like what everyone was telling me, I looked straight through my own lens to the wisdom of Hillel, ignoring everyone else, even my wife.  I quoted, “If not you, who?  If not now, when?”.  Who can argue with that, apparently nobody? I charged forward despite everyone telling me it was a bad idea.  I was tired of waiting, saw an opening, and knew I could make it happen.  Like Abraham and Sarah I was tired of waiting, had a plan, and wasn’t going to let anyone stop me.

At this point I want to hear what you would have done in both cases.

If you saw an opening to get what you have been dreaming about would you take it, even if everyone said it was a bad idea?

Comment below.  I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Consequences

It is clear by now that Abraham, Sarah, and I had all made some bad choices, and just like I teach my daughter, “bad choices lead to big consequences”.

In Abraham and Sarah’s story, they went forward with Sarah’s plan, but quickly learned that they made a mistake.  Genesis 16:11-12 states that:

Genesis 16:11–12 NIV

The angel of the Lord also said to her: “You are now pregnant and you will give birth to a son. You shall name him Ishmael, for the Lord has heard of your misery. He will be a wild donkey of a man; his hand will be against everyone and everyone’s hand against him, and he will live in hostility toward all his brothers.”

The angel told Hagar that Ishmael will “live in hostility toward all his brothers”.  God gave Abraham and Sarah a child through Hagar, but there was a consequence.  They lost peace and traded it for hostility.

Waiting Concludes

At this point it would be reasonable to assume that Abraham, Sarah’s story is over.  They screwed it up and received their consequences.  The great news is that our God is a God of second chances, and a God that is faithful to His promises.  He didn’t give up on Abraham and Sarah, and He doesn’t give up me, and he doesn’t give up on you.  Our God is a redemptive God, and He can redeem even our biggest failures and darkest sins.

In Genesis 17:19, God re-affirms His promise to Abraham and Sarah that they will have a child.

And in Genesis 21:1-3 we learn that

Genesis 21:1–3 NIV

Now the Lord was gracious to Sarah as he had said, and the Lord did for Sarah what he had promised. Sarah became pregnant and bore a son to Abraham in his old age, at the very time God had promised him. Abraham gave the name Isaac to the son Sarah bore him.

Now if you do the math, Abraham and Sarah waited 10 years after God’s original promise before they had Ishmael.  They waited another 15 years after Ishmael was born before God gave them Isaac.  They waited 25 years and were 100 years old before God gave them the son He promised.  And that was God’s plan, it was His perfect timing to have them wait 25 years.

My story turned out about as good as Abraham and Sarah’s.  I pushed forward.  My wife and I got licensed as foster parents and took in a 14 year old Honduran refugee.  We didn’t want the drama of visits with the biological parents, so we decided going the refugee route would be easier.  I know, taking the easy route is always the shortest path to success.  It didn’t quite work out that way, this boy didn’t speak English, which was interesting because we didn’t speak Spanish.  I know what you’re thinking, and I didn’t think that would be a problem either.  It turned out, he had no desire to learn English, we couldn’t learn Spanish fast enough, and Google translate is not very good in real time with an angry teenager yelling at it. After two months of doing our best, he was moved to a Spanish speaking house, and the foster care worker quit due to the stress of dealing with our case.  Just like Abraham and Sara, we had no peace, but lots of hostility.

This was a setback, I admit, but I still wouldn’t be deterred.  I knew I was doing right, so I convinced my wife to try again with an English speaking child this time.  We got an 8 year old boy.  He was awesome.  The problem was that nobody could agree on what was best for him.  We had him for a year.  From the start, the foster agency wanted him adopted ASAP and ideally with his brother. They asked us 2 weeks in to adopt them both.  The judge told us that the boy should not have siblings because of his history with his brother, so adopting with his brother felt reckless.  At the same time as all this was happening, my wife became pregnant, which made the whole “no sibling order” from the judge much more complicated.  For a year, everyone did what they thought was right, but could never agree.  In the end the foster agency convinced his brother’s foster parents to adopt them both.  Without warning, they showed up, told us we did a great job with him, and in the next breath told us they were taking him.  We were broken.  This was a boy that lived with us for a year, that called us mom and dad.  That hugged and kissed us goodnight every night.  That would write our initials in chalk hearts he would draw on the driveway, my name in red, my wife’s name in blue, and his name in purple showing he was a combination of us both because we were all a family.  We were ready to adopt him once everyone agreed it was best for him, we even had the paperwork filled out.  But now he was gone and we were told that the adopting parents didn’t want us to see him to speed up his attachment to them.  We haven’t seen him in 6 years.  I send him a birthday card and Christmas card every year with a short update, ask how he’s doing, and always include my e-mail and phone number but have never gotten a response.  That was a year filled with hostility, and has robbed us of immeasurable peace since.

Learn Through Failure

Abraham, Sarah, and I all failed to wait for God’s timing, but as Dirk said last week about David, failure is an opportunity for God to teach us.  Abraham, Sarah, and I got it wrong, but their great-grandson Joseph is a great example of someone getting it right. Joseph’s story started with God giving him a dream that his brothers would bow down to him.  To keep that from happening they sold him into slavery.  He was later falsely accused of a crime and sent to prison.  He helped some inmates by interpreting their dream and asked for their help, but he was forgotten and left in jail.  Joseph had to wait 23 years before he went before Pharaoh and His dream / promise was realized.  Throughout those 23 years, Genesis 39:2a (NLT) says

Genesis 39:2 NLT

The Lord was with Joseph, so he succeeded in everything he did as he served in the home of his Egyptian master.

Joseph viewed waiting on God’s promise through the lens of service.  It didn’t matter how horrible his life was, and how far he felt he was from God’s promise, he served others through the waiting.

What God taught me through the story of Abraham Sarah, and their great-grandson Joseph was that waiting well is like taking a good photograph.  Bear with me.  This is my camera.

[pick up and show camera]

I bought it when I was coaching hockey because I wanted to take pictures of the team throughout the season and make custom awards for the kids for the end of year party.  You may think, I went a little overboard with my camera choice, and arguably I did.  But having a camera like this forced me to learn a lot about photography.  I quickly learned that a nice camera does not guarantee a nice picture.  To take a good picture, I learned there are three things you need to pay attention to; the scene (what all you want in your picture), the depth of field (how much of the picture you want to be in focus), and the subject (the main point of interest you want people to pay attention to).

You see while I was waiting, I was making myself the subject of my picture, much like Abraham and Sarah did.  I was focusing on myself and what I wanted to happen, letting everything else remain very far out of my focus.  Something like this…

What God has taught me is that waiting is about taking the focus off myself (having faith that God will take care of me in His time) and put my focus on those around me that need my help, much like Joseph did.  Something like this…

It probably didn’t even register that my daughter was laying on the ground crying in the first picture.  How terrible of a parent would I be if I ignored by hurt child, because I was too focused on myself?  But this is what a lot of us do while we wait.  We ignore (or don’t even see) the pain of others, and focus completely on ourselves and what we want.

My Conclusion

My story concludes with my wife and I still waiting. In the 6 years since our foster son moved out.  Since then, God has taught us a so much about listening, waiting, and obeying Him.  He has given my wife and I opportunities to serve that we, honestly, would have had to turned down if we had both kids.  I was able to go to seminary and learn so much more about Him and who He wants me to be, we were able to serve through lead a youth group, we served by helping to plant a church, and we learned so much about parenting while trying to raise our 6 year old daughter.  My daughter now is asking why she doesn’t have a sibling and having volunteered with World Vision as much as we have she knows about the struggles of kids around the world.  She has asked about foster care and we’re discerning if this is a sign that this is God’s timing.  We don’t know yet, but we don’t want to repeat the mistakes of the past by acting outside of His will this time.

Conclusion

I think the lenses we’ve been taught to view waiting are wrong.  I don’t think waiting is about doing nothing while we silently suffer like these children stories teach.  I don’t think waiting is about jumping at the first opportunity to force what we want to happen like Hillel taught and Abraham, Sarah, and I did.

This may be the hardest thing you’ll hear this week.  But even when life is falling apart (and we have experience a lot of that over the last few months), even when you get tired of waiting, and even when you don’t know what to do.  We are called to serve.

God calls us to serve through our waiting

Generations after Joseph, we’re given the perfect example of how to serve while waiting.  Jesus, in Matthew 20:28 states that

Matthew 20:28 NIV

just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

Jesus gave up being in heaven to come down to earth.  He took the focus off himself as God and humbled himself by focusing on us.  And he asks us to do the same.  John 13:12-15 states that

John 13:12–15 NIV

When he had finished washing their feet, he put on his clothes and returned to his place. “Do you understand what I have done for you?” he asked them. “You call me ‘Teacher’ and ‘Lord,’ and rightly so, for that is what I am. Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet. I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you.

Application

This week, we saw protests continue day after day with many peacefully marching, trying to get the police and government to hear their pain, and finally make changes to bring justice to a broken system.  It is sad that instead of focusing on the changes that need to happen, the news highlights the examples when protesters went too far and things drifted to rioting.  We also saw many stories when the police went too far and used violence against peaceful protests.  Through all these stories one caught my attention.  The leaders from Black Lives Matter in Kansas City decided to take a different approach.  They met with the police chief ahead of any scheduled protest.  Instead of marching, and waiting for others to change the system, both sides decided it would be better to serve each other lunch.  Instead of a rally, the Black Lives Matter group in Kansas City hosted a citywide cookout in a local park and served the police lunch.  Police officers, African Americans, Hispanics, Latinos, and Caucasians sat around tables together and talked.  The small conversations over lunch turned into a public forum later that day where 100s of people gathered, had an open discussion with the police about challenges they are facing, and together they started discussing how they can start making improvements. Instead of protesting and waiting for a system to improve, the people of Kansas City served the police a meal, got to know each other, and started to break down the walls of tension between the two groups. They took the focus off of themselves and their pain, and let God work through their service to break down barriers and plant the seeds of real change.

As you go about your week, look past your pain, see the people around you who are hurting, and find ways to serve them.  Don’t get tired of waiting, have faith that God is using this period to teach you, prepare you, and work through you as you serve.

Imagine what kind of a world we’d be living in if we all could focus less on ourselves, genuinely see the pain that others are feeling, and let God work through our willingness to serve.

Prayer

Please join me in prayer.  Dear God, we do not wait well.  We are, by nature selfish, and impatient.  We want to trust you like David did, letting you prepare us for the future battles you have for us to fight, but we get impatient and greedy like Judas.  We start to doubt your promises and take matters into our own hands.  Help us to see the waiting you call us to through the lens of Joseph.  Help us to take the focus off ourselves and re-direct it onto others.  Help us see the hurt and needs of others and act.  Help us serve through the waiting. We know that your plans are good, and your timing is perfect.  Help us to have the patience to allow you to use our waiting for your purpose.  In your son, Jesus, name we pray.  Amen.