Childs Howard Seasons of Waiting

Walking by Faith When Dreams Are Delayed
1. Auflage 2016
ISBN: 978-1-4335-4952-6
Verlag: Crossway
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 0 - No protection

E-Book, Englisch, 128 Seiten

We're all waiting for something. For some of us, it's a spouse. For others, it's children. For still others, it's physical healing. Unfortunately, when things don't go as planned and we end up having to wait, it's often hard to trust God's timing. But while there will always be delays and disappointments in this life, there is still hope; God has a purpose and a plan for every season of our lives, even when it feels like he just keeps saying no. In Seasons of Waiting, Betsy Childs Howard points us to examples of waiting from Scripture that teach us to understand our waiting as a parable of God's unfolding kingdom. In the process, she shows us how the gospel informs our response to unmet longings and delayed dreams-directing our attention to the day when Christ will return and all our waiting will be over.

Betsy Childs Howard (MA, Beeson Divinity School) is an editor for the Gospel Coalition. She is the author of Arlo and the Great Big Cover-Up and Polly and the Screen Time Overload. Betsy and her husband, Bernard, live with their two little boys in Birmingham, Alabama.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Childs Howard, Betsy

Leseproben

2

Waiting for a Bridegroom

Take my love, my Lord, I pour

At Thy feet its treasure store.

Frances Ridley Havergal, “Take My Life and Let it Be”

Katy has wanted to be married for as long as she can remember. Her number one career goal was always to be the mother of a large family. She read books on marriage and parenting when she was in her teens. Still unattached after college, she applied to graduate schools a bit reluctantly, worried that further study might cut into her childbearing years if the right man came along.

In spite of this, she finds herself in her midthirties with no prospect of a husband. Many of her peers who had other career aspirations had to adjust them as they married and had children, while she has the freedom to pursue any career. Any career, that is, besides the one she most wants. Sometimes it seems like our deepest desires are the ones God forgets.

It’s not that she finds singleness itself so bad, but living in perpetual limbo is difficult. She says, “Life would be a lot easier if I knew that lifelong singleness is God’s plan for me rather than living with uncertainty.” As she’s struggled to come to terms with her singleness, the question that plagues her is, If God wants her to be single, why hasn’t he taken away her desire for marriage?

Some would answer the question by saying that God allows this desire to persist because he does, in fact, want Katy to be married. They suggest that if she adjusts her idea of the kind of man she’s looking for, God will give her a husband. I think these people with their well-meant suggestions are missing the mark. While God may choose to bring Katy a husband any day, it’s also possible that he intends for her heart to continue to desire marriage without intending to satisfy that desire with a husband.

Pictures of Desolation

Throughout the Scriptures, we find pictures of a bride without a bridegroom. In the biblical world, there’s no such thing as a self-centered, Sex and the City single lifestyle. A bride without a bridegroom is a picture of desolation. Take Ruth. Naomi rightly discerned that there was no future in ancient Israel for a widowed Moabitess. Her widowhood consigned her to a place of poverty. God ultimately provided a husband for Ruth, but until he did, her life was one of poverty and shame.

While widowhood was common, it was highly uncommon for a woman never to marry. (There wasn’t a category for “single” on ancient census forms.) Yet among the other tragic accounts in the book of Judges, we find the strange story of Jephthah’s daughter in Judges 11. She was put to death because of her father’s ill-considered vow. We are told that she and her friends weep, not over the fact that she will die, but that she will die a virgin. It was considered a tragedy in that society for a woman to go to her grave unmarried.

We can be grateful that the plight of an unmarried woman today is not what it would have been in ancient times. She can work and support herself. She can own property. She doesn’t have to depend upon children to financially support her in old age.

Yet there is still sadness for a woman who considers that she may never give birth and never know the love of a husband. There is still shame in a society that asks “What’s wrong with you?” if you never pair up with another person. In spite of the fact that these aspects of singleness are painful, I believe God has purpose in that pain.

When the Bridegroom Comes

There’s another picture in the Bible of a bride without a bridegroom. Those around her who see her plight judge her forsaken. That bride was Israel. In exile, she was as desolate as a woman without a husband or children. But the prophet Isaiah prophesied a hopeful future for Israel:

For Zion’s sake I will not keep silent,

and for Jerusalem’s sake I will not be quiet,

until her righteousness goes forth as brightness,

and her salvation as a burning torch.

The nations shall see your righteousness,

and all the kings your glory,

and you shall be called by a new name

that the mouth of the LORD will give.

You shall be a crown of beauty in the hand of the LORD,

and a royal diadem in the hand of your God.

You shall no more be termed Forsaken,

and your land shall no more be termed Desolate,

but you shall be called My Delight Is in Her,

and your land Married;

for the LORD delights in you,

and your land shall be married.

For as a young man marries a young woman,

so shall your sons marry you,

and as the bridegroom rejoices over the bride,

so shall your God rejoice over you. (Isa. 62:1–5)

This prophecy portrays God’s return of favor to Israel as the coming of a longed-for bridegroom. It was partially fulfilled by Israel’s return from exile, but was ultimately fulfilled in the coming of Jesus, who referred to himself as the Bridegroom.

Watching and Waiting as a Parable

We find yet another bride waiting for a bridegroom in Jesus’s parable of the ten virgins in Matthew 25. Jesus told us that the kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who take lamps and go out to meet a bridegroom. That’s a scenario that is not immediately familiar to those of us living in the twenty-first century. I confess that before I ever studied it, I thought it described some sort of large-scale polygamous wedding! But as any commentary will tell you, the ten virgins are not, in fact, brides. They are bridesmaids, friends of the bride who share in the joy of her wedding day.

In the Jewish society of Jesus’s day, the first step of a marriage was the betrothal. This might happen while the bride was still young, and thus a significant period of time passed between betrothal and marriage. Once the day finally arrived for the wedding to take place, the groom would go to the house of the bride to get her. The whole wedding party would then joyfully process through the torch-lit night from the bride’s house to that of the bridegroom. Once they arrived, the groom would host the wedding feast.

In this parable, the groom was delayed. We are not told why he was delayed, and the members of the waiting wedding party apparently didn’t know either. As far as they knew, he might arrive at any minute, or he might keep them waiting for hours. Their wait lasted longer than they expected, and they naturally fell asleep.

The waiting—and the sleeping—of the bridal party abruptly ended in the middle of the night when word came that the bridegroom had finally arrived. Five of the bridesmaids had plenty of oil and were ready to start the procession. The five who had burned all of their oil started to scramble, but they could not find more oil in time to be welcomed into the feast with the bridal procession.

It is important to note that all ten of the girls fell asleep, not just the foolish ones. Although this parable is about watching, watching here is not synonymous with wakefulness but readiness. The wise maidens could sleep because they were prepared and would be ready the moment they were awakened by the bridegroom. The foolish maidens slept through the hours in which they might have found more oil.

It is similar to the difference between sleeping peacefully the night before a vacation because you are packed and ready, and getting caught unprepared for a trip because you accidentally fell asleep. The foolish virgins have slept away the time of preparation, so they missed the bridal procession and were not allowed to enter the feast.

This parable illustrates several truths about the kingdom of heaven. First, although Christ’s kingdom has begun, it has not yet been fully realized. In this sense, we are like a bride betrothed but not yet married. The consummation of the kingdom will occur when Jesus returns in power and triumph. Like the wedding party in the parable, we don’t know how long it will be before our Bridegroom returns to claim his bride.

Second, if we want to be ready for that consummation when the kingdom comes, we must be fortified for a long wait. In spite of the delay, we must keep our bags packed. The waiting will end suddenly, and we must not allow the waiting to make us forget what we are ultimately waiting for. In the words of German theologian Helmut Thielicke:

With Jesus we do not know when he will come again or when he will summon us to come with him. We do not know the moment when everything that is so madly important to us—our career, our success, our failure, and our dejection—will vanish. We do not know when he will become the only thing that has any importance to us. Therefore we must be on the lookout and ready for him at any moment. For every single hour of our life is marked with this one, unpredictable moment when we shall stand alone and face Jesus Christ.4

The Waiting Church

We’ve looked at several different biblical scenarios: the tragic daughter of Jepthah, weeping that she will die a virgin; desolate Israel, a husbandless bride whose weeping is turned to joy when the bridegroom returns; and the bridesmaids who have not prepared for the bridegroom’s arrival and are caught unawares when he finally comes. Which story will be Katy’s story?

If God ever gives her a husband, she will live out the picture...