My least favorite part of visiting the doctor is sitting in the waiting room (can I get an amen?). Maybe I am just impatient, but I like to be in-and-out when I see the doctor or the dentist. If I’m going to be told I have a cavity or need a prescription for a rash, I’d rather just get it over with. But there I am, sitting on an uncomfortable chair just listening for my name and piddling around on my phone. Waiting often feels annoying.
Yet, waiting is the posture of the Christian life. Read the Bible and the posture of waiting describes most of the people and times in the Old and New Testaments. Abraham waited quite a while for the promised son. David waited years to sit on the throne. Israel waited centuries for the coming of the Messiah.
In the New Testament, Paul writes that the Corinthians lack no gift as they “wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Cor 1:7). We live in a time of waiting. The next big event in God’s purposes for the world is the second coming of Jesus. We are waiting for his revealing, when God will reveal to the world that Jesus is Lord and every knee will have to bow and every tongue confess that he is Lord.
But this posture of waiting is not passive. We are not just dawdling around here on earth twiddling our thumbs waiting for Jesus. This is not a kick-back-and-take-a-nap kind of waiting.
We are called to an active kind of waiting. In Jesus, God’s grace enriches us with spiritual gifts (1 Cor 1:4-7). God intends that we use these gifts of speech and knowledge and service during this time of waiting. This is a get-to-work-while-you-wait kind of waiting.
God does not leave us destitute while we wait. He enriches us with all we need for actively serving Christ. He gives us gifts of speech for encouraging one another, edifying Christ’s people, and sharing the gospel with the lost. He gives us gifts of knowledge to know how to live for his glory in a dark, complex world. These gifts are evidence of God’s grace. They confirm that the good news of Jesus is working among us (v. 6).
But our God not only gives us these gifts, he sustains us while we wait. Waiting takes strength. On our own, we would botch this whole waiting business. The Corinthians were doing a pretty good job of that with all the conflict in their church, the sin they let slide, the pride they let fester. Yet, God’s grace promised to sustain them, and it will sustain us to the very end.
God is always faithful (1 Cor 1:9). He has called us into fellowship with Jesus, and he will strengthen us to the very end when Jesus returns and the waiting is over. His grace saves and sustains. His grace establishes us as blameless before him, and in Christ we can never lose this position and this future.
For now, we are waiting for the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. But we are not in a waiting room watching for someone to come and fetch us. As Jesus put it several times in the Gospels, we are servants with work to do, gifts and resources to steward (Matt 24:45–51; 25:14–30; Luke 16:1–13; 17:7–10). God has enriched us and equipped us to live for him while we wait. We wait for the return of our King by using what he has given us for the sake of his kingdom and glory.
Theology and Technology 