I Couldn’t Believe What I Was Seeing!
This morning I was heading to the church to meet with a contractor. While driving east on Manatee Avenue I noticed about 2 1/2 blocks ahead of me was a pickup truck pulling out from a side road and racing across the traffic to get into the far lane of traffic heading eastbound on Manatee Avenue just like I was. Two things caught my attention. The first was how fast he was moving. The second was he was pulling a trailer. As I got about a block closer, the red brake lights of the vehicles in front of me started to come on and traffic slowed almost to a standstill. I soon knew why. There on the edge of the far-right lane was the truck pulled up on the grass and behind it was the trailer being used to carry a 12-14-foot boat which had been flipped over. In his impatience to cross the road and get where he wanted to go, he had jackknifed the trailer while at the same time putting himself and others at considerable risk. And I suspect the boat and trailer were both damaged in some way.
As I drove past the scene of this accident, he was getting out of the truck to survey the damage and try to figure out what to do. I remember thinking to myself, he just made his day a lot worse. I wondered what was so important or urgent to cause him to do something so reckless and dangerous. Traffic was pretty light behind me. Had he waited a literally a minute or two, his day would have gone a lot better. I am reasonably sure he reached his destination much later than he originally hoped. I’ll no doubt never know what seemed so important or urgent to him. However, I am pretty confident of this – it probably was not nearly as important or urgent as he thought. It simply seldom is.
There is an important lesson here for all of us. I think it is safe to say we are a people that do not like the idea of waiting. You could even say in our society the word “wait” or the idea of having to wait is something we frown upon and resist if at all possible.
A word of personal confession is in order here. As many of you know Cinda and I had COVID-19 test done back on Friday, July 10th. First a week passed and no results, then 2 and then 3. Then on Wednesday Cinda got her negative result back and suggested I look for mine as well. Just 2 days shy of 4 weeks and Cinda finally got her “results”. Well I look for mine and none were to be found. Strange I thought since I was tested about 45 seconds after she was. Then I got a message that my results were ready and would be posted on Thursday the 6th. Thursday came and went and still no results. Let me say I was a bit more than a little bit irritated. I had to wait until Friday and hope that just maybe after 4 weeks they would finally be there. They were and they were negative also. I was irritated that I had to wait longer. I’m sure I am not alone. We are people who do not like to wait.
It’s interesting that waiting in the Bible is not a negative term at all. Many times, you will read of people being told to wait on the Lord. Waiting is a virtue according to the biblical witness. Waiting and trusting are inseparably linked. Waiting helps foster gratitude, patience, perspective, and faith. Waiting is a key component of character. And waiting is indispensable when it comes to our relationship with God. Perhaps we struggle with waiting because it means giving up control and trying to orchestrate the way we think our lives should play out. The good news is when we give up control God takes over. And that is always in our best interest. It’s always well worth the wait!
Grace and Peace, John