On Waiting

Think about all the time you have to think or maybe pray when you are waiting. It makes waiting turn from a frustration to yearned for moments of solitude in the everyday world. Waiting used to kill me. And sometimes, I think it still does. But in society waiting is seen as something bad, so embracing it is pretty rebellious and healthy.

I love this sharing about *waiting* Its seems to be what the mind does to manage the unknown. I have discovered when I fully embrace the feeling of waiting there is no gap of separation between now and whatever the mind thinks its waiting for. Waiting is really another opportunity to fully be here, to be one with all of life.

I think of my grandmother who died a few years ago at the age of 96. She spent the last four years of her life in a nursing home, where she struggled with physical frailness and dementia. She couldn’t do much more than sit in her chair, yet every time I visited her, she greeted me with a smile, a kiss and “Hello, honey. I’ve been waiting for you.” In those later years, she exuded warmth, love and and a sometimes wicked sense of humor (one that she never showed us in earlier years). She also prayed constantly. There were many days when my brothers, parents and I would visit her and unburden ourselves with something we needed her to pray for. We always knew that whether it was big or small, if we asked her to, Grandma would be praying. Now that she has moved on to heaven, the memory of her in her chair with the rosary in her hands makes me think of a quote I once read that said “To pray much is to love much.”

I immediately thought of the story of Mary and Martha. In my mind Martha is the older sister who is being “responsible”, making sure that she meets the physical needs of Jesus and those around Him. Mary is sitting at His feet, listening to and being present to Jesus. To me being present to people however they are feeling and regardless of what they are saying is being most Christ-like and most difficult. God bless you, Sr. Julie, as you stay present to your friend.

This is so appropos right now. My dear classmate was diagnosed with cancer two days ago. Right now, there is nothing to do for her while she plots out her treatment with her surgeon–nothing, that is, except to sit and wait and encourage and love and hold her close in prayer and thought.

If I may change the quotation, on account of my gender, to ‘He also serves who sits and waits’, it means to me that God’s personal calling is first and foremost to be with him; it is a call to being rather than doing; an invitation simply to be in his presence. Only out of this stillness and being in him can I be genuinely responsive to God’s call to action, so I hope that I serve while I sit and wait.

Because our culture (oops, there’s that word again) glorifies doing at the expense of being, prayer can easily get turned into another kind of activity. I can be tempted to measure it by its usefulness, and to think of it as getting things done. But in my heart I know that prayer is an end in itself, an invitation to waste time gracefully. It’s my response to an inner longing for God, sitting and waiting, whereas much of my busyness is a response to a vaguely guilty feeling that I need to ‘achieve something’. Sitting and waiting in prayer, by contrast, is ‘useless’ – although I know that nothing is more important!

I thank God that, for some people, His personal calling is simply to this contemplative dimension of life, a call to being rather than doing. Their calling is to witness by what they are, and by their style of life, to this dimension of existence in God. Maybe God calls some of you exclusively to this because its importance as one aspect of life for all of us is so little realised in our activist world.

To me this means giving up the illusion of control, especially when something bad has happened. To just sit and wait – for guidance, strength, the motivation to go on one more minute in light of what you’re facing. It is to sit and wait for God to settle into the situation and help to unravel it one day at a time – for that, I have to wait. I can’t have the whole answer in one serving.

I can really appreciate this quote today; my grandfather is in the hospital and not expected to live. I’ve been with him everyday, and since we have said all we want to one another in preparation of his passing there is nothing I can do for him but sit quietly and just “be” with him. It’s a reassuring thought that just sitting quietly and waiting is an act of service, especially to someone that has been such a servent to others in his life.

With Pentecost coming up (and since it is one of my favorite liturgical celebrations), I’ve been reflecting lately on the work of the Holy Spirit in my life, and in the lives of my friends and family. I feel that quote is an invitation to listen to the Spirit, and sometimes it takes a long time (at least for me!) to figure out what the Spirit is asking of me. But, the time spent listening is a gift in itself.

I loved reading all of the comments so far. My favorite line is about prayer being an invitation to “waste time gracefully” from Christopher. That’s a wonderful way to put it!

Just one more thought. Here in UK the expression ‘keeping busy’ (which is the opposite of sitting and waiting) is invariably used in an optimistic sense. So if I pass a neighbour in the street and say ‘How are you?’ he might well reply ‘Keeping busy!’ One of these days I’ll respond by saying, ‘Oh, I’m sorry to hear that!’

That waiting is an activity. As a society, we don’t give waiting it’s fair due. Ask anyone in any waiting room in any hospital. They are busy waiting. Sometimes t0 sit there and wait IS what you are suppose to do.