Wait For It

LAs I attended our Church kick-off for our Christmas Pageant, my mind began to wander. The name of our Pageant this year is The Waiting Room. That brought to mind that our life is a constant round of waiting. From the beginning of who we are, we wait to be born. There is an estimated date of birth, yet, Moms and Dads are in a holding pattern, waiting for the blessed event. Even after that first birth pain, it's a wait time until the little one is actually here.

From then on, we wait. Babies can't do for themselves, so they wait for Mom to feed them, change them, and they wait for the day they can walk, talk, and run. We wait to go to Kindergarten and be a big kid. We wait to learn to ride a bike. We wait to become a teenager and we wait for our first date, first kiss!

We all grew up with so many phrases telling us to wait. Wait your turn, wait for me. Wait until your Father comes home! (I heard that one a lot!) You have to wait until after dinner for dessert. Wait and see, waiting for the weekend! We spend most of our time waiting for something. It's hard to wait. Most of us don't really enjoy waiting. We want instant gratification. Instant reward. 

As we get older, waiting is just as hard as when you were a child waiting for Christmas. As adults our waits get more complicated, more serious, more urgent. We apply for a job, then we wait. Will we get it? We have a chance to buy the home of our dreams...then we wait to see if it is ours. We become engaged to be married. We wait through months of planning before the magical day arrives. We wait for our children to be born just as our parents waited for us. 

Through our waiting life, we will at some point wait in a hospital waiting room. A loved one is in surgery, or very ill. We wait on tests, we wait for the doctor to fix it. We pray and wait for  God to heal. We wait for retirement, we wait for children to come home to visit, and we wait for the end of our life!

God's people waited too. They waited throughout the Bible for God to rescue them from their enemies, from tragedies, and  they waited for God to send their Messiah. God's plan didn't unfold all at once, it took many generations before His perfect plan was born! After waiting years and years, Jesus was born! We waited when we didn't know what we were waiting for. 

God sent His son to earth, as a human baby, so that He could shed His blood for each of us. If you have not given your heart to Jesus, this is foreign to you. It was to me too. We are all sinners. Because God is perfect, He can not be in a relationship with sinners. So He planned to send His son to take our sin on Himself, bleed and die, so that sin could be forgiven. Jesus waited three years while He taught God's word to many, before He was crucified for us. 

Jesus waited in the grave three days, then arose and is still with us! If we ask Him to forgive us, He will. We are made clean with the blood He shed. Now we can have a personal relationship with God, and we can spend eternity with Him! The blood of the Lamb, Jesus covers us. Right now, if you haven't given your life, your heart to Him, He is waiting! 

Our final wait is when we close our eyes on this world, and open them in heaven. When we accept Him, turn from our sin, and ask forgiveness, we are assured we will spend eternity with God in Heaven. So we wait. We are not fearful, because it is a joyful event, and we are at peace. We as believers know Jesus is coming back. If we do not die before that, we will be caught up in the air when Jesus returns for us. And we wait! Will you take Him as your Savior, so you can wait in peace? Are you ready for the final wait of this life? It is a free choice. God will not force you, but He is waiting just for you!