Patience
Rev. Mark Schaefer
Kay Spiritual Life Center
December 12, 2004
Isaiah 35:1-10; James 5:7-10
Isaiah 35 1 ¶ The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad, the desert shall rejoice and blossom; like the crocus 2 it shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice with joy and singing. The glory of Lebanon shall be given to it, the majesty of Carmel and Sharon. They shall see the glory of the LORD, the majesty of our God.
3 ¶ Strengthen the weak hands, and make firm the feeble knees. 4 Say to those who are of a fearful heart, “Be strong, do not fear! Here is your God. He will come with vengeance, with terrible recompense. He will come and save you.”
5 ¶ Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; 6 then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy. For waters shall break forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert; 7 the burning sand shall become a pool, and the thirsty ground springs of water; the haunt of jackals shall become a swamp, the grass shall become reeds and rushes.
8 ¶ A highway shall be there, and it shall be called the Holy Way; the unclean shall not travel on it, but it shall be for God’s people; no traveler, not even fools, shall go astray. 9 No lion shall be there, nor shall any ravenous beast come up on it; they shall not be found there, but the redeemed shall walk there. 10 And the ransomed of the LORD shall return, and come to Zion with singing; everlasting joy shall be upon their heads; they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.James 5 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. 9 Beloved, do not grumble against one another, so that you may not be judged. See, the Judge is standing at the doors! 10 As an example of suffering and patience, beloved, take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord.
I. INTRODUCTION
There’s an old joke about a camel and a donkey walking through the desert. It’s a long joke and involves the donkey asking over and over again when they will get water. The donkey’s symptoms get worse and worse and every day he says, “Camel, can we stop for water?” And the camel responds, “Patience, jackass. Patience.” The joke drags on and every day the donkey’s symptoms get worse and every day he asks when they’re stopping for water and every day that camel says, “Patience, jackass. Patience.” Well, the object of this joke is actually to drive the person listening to it crazy, until they finally say, “When does this joke end?” at which point the joke-teller says, “Patience, jackass. Patience.” I definitely fell for that one as a kid.
Because, I am an impatient person. I don’t like to wait for things.
If I get an idea for doing something, I often want to do it right away. Often this keeps me here late at night when I could be home, such is my dislike of waiting. If I get an idea about something I want to buy, I have to go out and get it right away. Tomorrow simply won’t do. I’m getting therapy, though, so no worries.
But as impatient as I am now, when I was a kid, I was worse. Because around October this wonderful book would show up in the mail: the J.C. Penney Christmas Catalog. My sister and I would leaf through the catalog—skipping over that boring part at the beginning—and circle all the toys that we hoped Santa would bring. And once that had happened, the long period of suffering began as we waited those 60 agonizing days until Christmas. And once we got into December, it only seemed like the days were slowing down. It was maddening. Maybe you know what I’m talking about.
We Americans aren’t a particularly patient people. We don’t like to wait for anything. Whether it’s standing on line for movie tickets, or getting a hold of one another, we want what we want now.
What are the things you are waiting for that you’d rather have sooner than later? The end of finals? The end of this sermon? Waiting for all the Christmas music to be sung in church… Patience, patience.
II. THE TEXT
We wait and we are anxious because we don’t like waiting. And then we read those words of James:
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. 9 … 10 As an example of suffering and patience, beloved, take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord.
James is counseling the early church in patience. They are beginning to get anxious about Jesus’ return and James reminds them to be patient. As patient as a farmer waiting for crops from the earth. As patient as the prophets who both suffered and were patient.
III. A LONG DELAYED EXPECTATION
James was counseling his church about a much bigger issue than movie tickets or exams or anything like that. He was counseling them in patience waiting for Jesus’ return.
A. The Apostles
The apostles all certainly believed that the Kingdom was coming soon. In the book of Acts it is reported that at Jesus’ ascension, forty days after that first Easter, they asked him, “Lord, is this the time when you will restore the kingdom to Israel?” He replied, “It is not for you to know the times or periods that the Father has set by his own authority.” (Acts 1:6-7)
Jesus had been saying that the “Kingdom of God was at hand” and himself seemed to believe that its arrival was imminent. Alright, so if it’s not right now, it must be soon, right?
B. Paul
Certainly Paul was in that camp. In writing to his congregation in Corinth, he says:
“Listen, I will tell you a mystery! We will not all die, but we will all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed.”
Paul is clearly expecting to be one of those who “will not die” but will be changed. That is, when the Resurrection of the Dead happens at the Inauguration of the Kingdom, Paul expects not to be one of the dead raised to new life, he expects to be one of the living who witnesses it. I have said that no one was more surprised by Paul’s death than Paul.
C. Revelation
The author of the Book of Revelation, St. John of Patmos, counseled the Churches of Asia to be patient and endure, their deliverance was coming soon.
That was nearly 2,000 years ago.
We’ve been waiting a long time and certainly we’re starting losing patience.
IV. TIRING OF WAITING
The older I get the more I am content to wait. Much more so than when I was younger. And it may be that as the church has gotten older, the more content it is to wait. To push the Coming of the Kingdom off into the indefinite future. Maybe the church simply got tired of waiting.
A. Three Options
There are basically three options to deal with this kind of delay.
The first is to deny that there’s anything to wait for. That’s easy and cynical. It is basically the “life sucks” attitude and accepts the world as it is and sees no hope for its improvement. This philosophy often then seeks to change the world in its own image, seeking improvement according to its own schedule. Fascism, communism, and other forms of centralized, societal change are examples of that.
The second option is to claim that the Kingdom is here already. That the kingdom is present in the Church and in the faithful. This attitude creates a high wall of separation between the church and the world. The two have nothing to do with one another. Salvation belongs to those on the inside, among whom the Kingdom exists. The biggest problem here, is that this claim “spiritualizes” away all the claims of Jesus and the prophets. The Kingdom of God wasn’t really about the poor, or about justice, or about God’s reigning in righteousness over history, it was about an individualistic idea of the soul: my soul has been saved, I’m in the Kingdom, I’m all set.
The third option is by far the hardest. It expects the arrival of the Kingdom, looks at the world and says, “This is not how it’s supposed to be.” It requires the believer to live in an in-between state, part of one reality, waiting for another. That awaited reality often causes anxiety and impatience. And therein lies the challenge.
B. Isaiah’s Vision
For those who embrace the third option are challenged all the time by the vision of the Kingdom that has been laid out for us by Jesus and the Prophets. Particularly Isaiah:
The wilderness and the dry land shall be glad, the desert shall rejoice and blossom; like the crocus 2 it shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice with joy and singing. …
5 ¶ Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped; 6 then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy. For waters shall break forth in the wilderness, and streams in the desert; 7 the burning sand shall become a pool, and the thirsty ground springs of water; the haunt of jackals shall become a swamp, the grass shall become reeds and rushes.
8 ¶ A highway shall be there, and it shall be called the Holy Way; the unclean shall not travel on it, but it shall be for God’s people; no traveler, not even fools, shall go astray. 9 … And the ransomed of the LORD shall return, and come to Zion with singing; everlasting joy shall be upon their heads; they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.
Those who take the third option know in their hearts that “sorrow and sighing” have not fled away and that “everlasting joy” is not “upon their heads.” The tension between what is and what should be is the strongest.
C. When Will God Save the People?
In the musical Godspell, there is a song that asks exactly the question that the faithful have been asking for so long:
“When wilt thou save the people, O, God of mercy, when? The people, Lord, the people—not thrones and crowns, but men? … Shall crime bring crime forever, strength aide and steel the strong? Is it thy will, O Father, that men shall toil for wrong? No say thy mountains, no say thy skies, man’s clouded sun shall brightly rise, and songs be heard instead of sighs. God save the people…”
It’s hard not to wonder that: when will God save the people? Far easier to decide to change the world ourselves or to pretend that God has already brought the Kingdom.
V. PATIENCE
This is the Third Sunday in Advent—a time not only of preparation, but of patience. Patience is the reason we don’t sing Christmas music all the way through Advent, it teaches us that things come in their due season, as Jesus reminds us. And yet the patience that we are to exercise is not passive or inactive.
James counsels us: “As an example of suffering and patience, beloved, take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord.” Well, those prophets certainly were not inactive. Isaiah spoke out decrying injustice. Amos and Hosea challenged kings and rulers to reform. Jeremiah engaged in street theater to provoke and to teach. Many of the prophets gave their lives to speak in the name of the Lord.
Yet, they would never have pretended that they were bringing about God’ kingdom. They were challenging the present world with the vision of what God’s kingdom looks like. It is arrogant to assume that we ourselves alone can build the kingdom—we always seem to get into trouble when we do that. But we can follow the example of the prophets, challenging the world to reflect the reality of the Kingdom that is yet to come.
This is the patience that we are charged to have. It requires us to live in the tension between the already and the not-yet. It requires our faithful waiting. The patience we exhibit is a patience not to be deterred in our faith by a broken world. But most of all, it requires us to witness to the Kingdom we await.
We are Christians who await the return of their Christ. As such, we patiently commit our lives to justice, to compassion, to the “least of these”, to reconciliation, to living in right relationship with one another. To a way of life that shows in the here-and-now what life in the Kingdom will look like.
We are in Advent for another two weeks. But in one way, we have been in Advent our whole lives, awaiting the arrival of our Christ.
Patience, my friends. Christmas is coming.
