This is part two, following Waiting. The unwanted resource)

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In the readings for this week of Advent, Peter and Mark talked about waiting periods.

Mark starts his gospel with words from Isaiah 40. The people of Israel are suffering. They have been promised God, and they are experiencing suffering. They feel abandoned by God, attacked by others. A word comes from God through the prophet:

Comfort my people. The time is coming. Prepare the way of the Lord.

It was a good word. An encouraging word. There will be relief.

The next time we read those words, prepare the way of the Lord, is 700 years later. They are quoted by Mark to describe John the Baptist preparing the way for Jesus.

700 years later.

During that seven hundred years, things got worse. Israel and Judea were taken into exile. They came back, but were almost always an occupied country. Usually by Rome.

So that time in between had people waiting and waiting and waiting.

And then Jesus came. But the story didn’t turn out all happy.

Jesus was born, went quiet, and then, with John, exploded on the scene. He preached and healed and taught and people thought that things were all better. And then he died, rose, and then disappeared.

And another season of waiting started. We’re in that season now.

That’s what Peter wrote about. The wait for the return of Jesus and the coming of the kingdom of God. And the truth that God has a different understanding of time than we do.

We’ve been waiting for that for almost 2000 years. It’s as if God’s people are stuck waiting forever. Which Peter talks about.

What we need isn’t answers. We’re not going to get the answers while we are alive.

What we need isn’t completeness. We’re not going to get to completeness while we are alive.

What we need is peace. We need to know the peace of God in the middle of the chaos and uncertainty, in the middle of not having answers or completeness.

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The readings for this week are from Isaiah 40:1-11, 2 Peter 3:8-15a, Psalm 85, Mark 1:1-8