Active Waiting

We all know the story – the angel Gabriel appears to Mary and tells her that she is going to have a baby whose “…kingdom there will be no end.” [Luke 1.33]

If I was Mary, I would have been like “Whoa angel, where did you come from, and, uh, I think you’re looking for that guy” where I would have pointed to Joseph. I’d be a mess! Can you imagine - an angel appearing and telling you something that didn’t make sense? Maybe not unlike me, Mary might have been a little confused. She is described as being “…greatly troubled at what was said…” [Luke 1.29]

As anxious as she may have been, as troubled as she may have been, as curious as she may have been at what the angel told her, Mary took the plunge. “Be it done unto me according to thy word.” [Luke 1.38]

And then she is left to wait. 9 months. Knowing that she is going to have a baby that an angel said would be “great” and would be called “Son of the Most High” [Luke 1.32] That would be a tough waiting game!

Like Mary, we are continually waiting. Some of the things for which we wait are more defined – while in high school, we await graduation. While at work, we await our vacation. But many things, maybe even some of the most important things we await (like for Mary), are less concrete in that the destination is unclear or the timeline is impossible to know. And that can make us anxious.

Will I stay in this job forever? Will I get married? Will I have children? Will I stay healthy? How long will I live? And so on…

My uncle has a sign over the entrance to his kitchen that says “Blessed are those who take joy in the journey.” As we continue on our journey, may we “actively wait” to uncover our destinations.

Active waiting, to me, means two things:
- faithfully and confidently going through life trying to do the best with what we’ve been given, and
- trying to grow in self-awareness so that we can recognize and seize better opportunities to do God’s will.

As Karol Wojtyla wrote in 1956, years before he became Pope John Paul II, “…life is a constant development toward that which is better, more perfect – if there is no stagnation within us.” [p102 Witness to Hope by George Weigel] Stagnation, to me, is passive waiting. The opposite would be “active waiting.”

Mary’s leap of faith with the angel Gabriel provides a great example for us – active waiting, by knowing that we are doing our best to fulfill God’s will, is more important than knowing or understanding our destination. May we all, then, follow Mary’s lead, even if it means “taking a plunge of faith”, and actively wait…