Waiting for the Lord
(avg. read time: 23–45 mins.)
The season of Advent more than any time in the Christian calendar draws attention to the fact that waiting is a dimension of Christian faith. This waiting is waiting for the Lord, waiting for the Lord to save, waiting for the Lord to fulfill his promises. And this theme is constant throughout the Bible. Though there are several examples—especially in Proverbs—on the value of patience in general, the essential character of waiting in biblical faith most often appears in the context of covenantal history. Canonically speaking, the first clear appearance of this theme is in the story of Abraham and it progresses through to the story of Jesus, after which it takes on a new form in waiting for the Second Coming of Jesus and the consummation of the kingdom. As such, the theme carries through from Genesis to Revelation, and so does this charting of the theme. This is going to be rather extensive and the reader may find this beneficial to return to over the course of Advent if they do not wish to try reading this all in one sitting.
The Patriarchs and Matriarchs of Genesis
First, Abraham was seventy-five years old before God ever called him (back when he was Abram) to go to another land and gave him the first set of promises in what would become known as the Abrahamic covenant. But for God to make a great nation of Abram, the latter first had to wait until he was a hundred years old and Sarah was ninety before they received the child of promise, Isaac. In the intervening years, he spent his time in waiting by accumulating wealth, protecting the household he had, and, on two important occasions, building altars (Gen 12:7; 13:18). Of course, one cannot forget that the most noteworthy action he took during those years was having sex with Hagar to father Ishmael. By this point, Abram had lived in Canaan for ten years, surely trying many times to father children by Sarai, all to no avail. And so Abram would surely have thought that this boy would be the bearer of his legacy, the foundation of the great nation that God would make of him. But when Abram was ninety-nine, twenty-four years after his initial calling, he became Abraham and God specifically promised that Sarai’s (now Sarah’s) barrenness that had lasted for decades (with her surely having gone through menopause by this point) would come to an end and Abraham, no spring chicken himself, would finally father a son by her. It was late in his life before God called him and two-and-a-half decades before he finally received the child of promise. It was not as if he was doing nothing during all of that intervening time, as noted above, but it is astounding how much waiting he had to do in order to reach these points in his life.
The same applies to Sarah. She did all of this waiting along with him, and she surely experienced the lion’s share of frustration and grief over their childbearing situation, which is most luridly demonstrated in that she is the one who beat Hagar out of her anger. She had left her homeland with her husband to go to a land they did not know. She had waited many years for God to plant the seed for his promises, yet she never conceived a child until she was eighty-nine. Up until that time, surely she thought about why she sacrificed as she had and yet she had only received barrenness and the consequent humiliation in return. And her greater share of frustration is perhaps why only her reaction to Isaac’s actual birth is recorded (21:1–7). Sarah’s joy has that peculiar quality of joy that comes after many years of waiting in hardship, what J. R. R. Tolkien would call eucatastrophic joy.
Isaac himself did not have to wait so long as his father—only sixty years—before he had children with Rebekah. As we do not have many canonical stories of Isaac after Abraham that do not revolve around his sons, the only other intersection of his life with this theme is the fact that he lived 120 more years, but even then, he only saw a glimpse of the promises of God coming to fruition. He lived long enough to witness most of Jacob’s and Esau’s lives and to be around for the births of all of his grandchildren (and likely even some great-grandchildren). He thus experienced a great multiplication of his family, but not the stuff of “the stars of the heavens.” In his lifetime, his father made a few more claims upon the lands of Canaan (21:22–34; 23), both of which Isaac renewed (26:1–33; 35:27–29). But for all of his years there was no expansion of owned property. Surely he knew the promise of God to Abraham about timing (15:12–19) and he himself had received the promise of land (26:1–5), but he would have to keep this story alive and maintain his trust in the God who made the promises, all while being aware that he would not live to see the full extent of those promises, despite himself being the child of promise.
His own son, Jacob, would have this theme woven into many parts of his life. Any young Christian of dating/courting age or remotely thinking about marriage is likely familiar with the story of Jacob working for Laban for fourteen years to earn his marriage to Rachel (though of course the original agreement was for seven years). He would have to wait several more years before he could have children with Rachel, his favored wife, due to God’s mercy on Leah, Jacob’s first wife. In other cases, his own waiting was a reflection of his father’s. Despite his long life and his witnessing his family multiply several times over, he still did not see God’s promises come to fruition. In fact, he ended his life in arguably a worse position than Isaac. He died in Egypt and had to ask Joseph to bury him back in the promised land. But in his last seventeen years of life, he saw his family establish itself in Egypt, carving out for themselves what was initially a comfortable existence, less susceptible to famine than Canaan. Not to mention that his family had surely made enemies with the allies of Shechem (34). In such contexts, he had to keep alive the story of the promises of God that his grandfather had received and which God passed on to him (28:13–22; 35:10–12). God even promised him that his descendants would come up again from Egypt, but he still had to trust the promise (46:2–4). In the respect of the family population, Jacob was closer to seeing God’s promise come to pass, but in terms of land possession, he seemed further away. Nevertheless, he spent his life faithfully waiting for the Lord.
Joseph’s waiting had less to do with the covenant, though his role was nevertheless essential to bringing Israel to Egypt and to being a blessing to other nations in the relief he provided during the famine (though the policy detailed in 47:13–26 would have tragic consequences). He had dreams of greatness when he was seventeen, but they did not come true until he was thirty. In between the dream and reality were thirteen years of waiting as someone sold by his own brothers, made a slave, accused of attempted rape, and imprisoned. In fact, it was my reading of the Joseph story back in seminary that spawned the idea of this study. I noted that the one clear time indicator in this story prior to Joseph’s interpretation of Pharaoh’s dream (as well as the note that he was thirty when he entered Pharaoh’s service in 41:46) is the statement in 41:1 that Joseph had spent two years in prison after the cupbearer had been restored to his position following the events of ch. 40. When he helped the cupbearer, Joseph thought this would be his way out of prison, but two years passed with nothing changing about his situation.
Two years is still quite a stretch of time, especially when one is caught in a situation like Joseph. One has to wonder if at times he almost or actually fell into despair, wondering what he had done that his life had taken such a turn. How many times did he have to go through a process of reassuring himself of God’s providence? Or did he even go through such a process? Maybe he was eventually turned cynical until the day he was called to Pharaoh. Maybe he did persevere in faith during this time, but possibly still found it hard to keep going. His life surely would not have been easy for him to understand. He had such marvelous dreams when he was a young man, and yet nearly every day since that time those dreams had brought him lower from an heir of a great patriarch to the slave of a captain to a prisoner with no clear avenue of release. Of course, there came a time when he was not only released but exalted to a station just below Pharaoh. In the eighty years that followed thereafter, he was reunited and reconciled with his family, he saw them become established in the land of Goshen, he saw the family continue to grow, and he was himself a primary conduit of blessing to many thousands outside of his family in Egypt and Canaan. But he only saw the fruition of God’s promises from far off. He too would pass on the covenant story that his father had told him and he would die in assurance that God will come bring the Israelites up from Egypt to the land he promised them (50:24–25). In the end, his perseverance in faithfulness and waiting for the Lord would preserve the legacy of Israel, and even as he unintentionally opened up the circumstances for Israel’s slavery in Egypt, he also unknowingly set up Israel for the miraculous deliverance that would define its identity, its identification of God, and its relationship with God.
Israel in Egypt and Exodus
Generations of Hebrews lived and died in Egypt for hundreds of years without ever seeing the land God promised to their ancestors. In fact, at least some of them would have had to pass along the story of God’s promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob while they were in slavery. While there is no way to confirm whether or not some of them lost faith along the way, it would not be surprising if their oppressive circumstances convinced them that God either never made the promises or had no intention or power of keeping them. After all, such are the dark thoughts that can cloud the mind of believers during times such as this era of slavery. But these stories gave these people an identity apart from their slavery through remembrance of many years past and they gave them hope for the future. Thus, many proceeded in passing on the stories while waiting for them to reach the promised climax, so that Moses and his generation were familiar with these stories (Exod 3:6, 13–17; 6:2–8). While it is more speculative, I also cannot help but wonder if creation stories or at least the conception of God as Creator did not also help in keeping this hope alive. The story provides some references to this concept explicitly (Exod 4:11; Deut 4:32) and it is implicit in the references to the stars of the heavens in God’s promises (Exod 32:13; Deut 1:10; 10:22) and in the ten plagues/wonders God brings upon Egypt. Furthermore, this linkage between the surety of God’s promises and God being the Creator and Sustainer of the functioning creation is prominent in later texts, especially where the covenant is in jeopardy due to the exile (Pss 65:5–13; 74:12–23; 89:5–18; 102:25–28; 135:5–7; 136:5–9; 145:15–16; 146:5–7; 147:4–5, 8–11, 14–18; Isa 40:12–31; 41:17–20; 42:5; 44:24–28; 45:8, 12–18; 48:7–13; 51:13–16; 54:5; Jer 31:35–37; 32:17–19; 33:2, 20–26; 51:15–19). Of course, they would have to wait until the exodus itself to see the most vivid link between God’s creative power and will with God’s faithful love expressed in covenant.
Moses and Aaron encapsulated this long wait. Moses spent the first forty years of his life as Egyptian royalty, then spent the next forty years in Midian. He was eighty before he encountered God and realized God’s purpose for him (Exod 7:7). Aaron similarly had to wait eighty-three years. Like Abraham and others I mention later, Moses and Aaron show that God’s calling can come at any time, and sometimes a person has to wait for a long time before his or her purpose becomes clear. And sometimes, as in the covenant history, the end of one’s own long wait could be the end of a long wait for many others.
Unfortunately, due to the Israelites’ rebelliousness and obstinacy, the exodus would not be the end of the wait for the promise of the promised land to be fulfilled. It would take the passing away of another generation (forty years) for Israel to enter into Canaan. Not even Moses or Aaron lived to enter the promised land, despite their extraordinarily long lives. Though they lived through an extraordinary time, including the exodus, even they could not see everything come to pass. Still, as is a constant theme in Deuteronomy, their ultimate responsibility to the generation that would see the promised land was to pass on the story of what God had done and to ensure that Israel would remember and be faithful in their remembrance (Deut 4:1–23; 5:15; 6:4–12, 20–25; 7:18; 8:2, 11–20; 9:7; 11:1–12; 15:15; 16:1–8, 12; 24:18, 22; 32:1–43).
In this same vein, the three central festivals of the Jewish faith established during the Wilderness Wandering are Passover and its subsequent Feast of Unleavened Bread, the Feast of Weeks/Pentecost, and the Feast of Sukkot/Tabernacles. The first commemorates the end of waiting for deliverance from slavery in Egypt and in subsequent generations it would become a way to look forward to the Jews’ deliverance from gentile overrule. The second commemorates the end of waiting for residence in the promised land and the fruitfulness that came therefrom. The third commemorates the time of the Wilderness Wandering, that time between times, in which Israel still had the duty of committing themselves to active waiting by obedience to the Torah.
Israel’s Early Generations in the Promised Land
But of the generation of Israelites who entered the promised land, none knew the stresses of waiting like Joshua and Caleb. These men were the two spies who had encouraged Israel to invade Canaan and thus they were the ones whom God enabled to see the promised land. Thirty-eight years later, they were old men. After they entered the promised land, they spent seven more years conquering the thirty-one cities listed in Josh 12. After forty-five total years, when Caleb was eighty-five years old, he finally received his piece of the promised land when Joshua granted him and his family the hill country of Hebron (14:6–15). In the intervening time, he could only secure such an allotment by continued faithfulness to God’s will. He spent the better part of his life waiting to stake his own claim in the promises of God and he simply had his trust and his obedience to keep him occupied until the time of fulfillment.
After the conquest in the time of the judges, various Israelite tribes experienced oppression under foreign powers after they had departed from the way of the Lord. Aram oppressed Israelites for eight years (Judg 3:8). Moab oppressed Israelites for eighteen years (3:14). Canaanites under the Hazorite king Jabin oppressed Israelites for twenty years (4:2). The Midianites oppressed Israelites for seven years, seemingly to a more severe degree than their predecessors (6:1–6). The Ammonites oppressed Israelites for eighteen years (10:8). The Philistines oppressed the Israelites for forty years before Samson became a leader (13:1) and they would continue to trouble the Israelites for many years thereafter. In each of these cases, Israelites had to wait for several years before God’s delivering action, usually without a clear indication of repentance, though they always cry out to God for help.
Naomi and Ruth were both caught in the tragedy of widowhood without children. Naomi had lived in the land of Moab for ten years without seeing her family grow. For some portion of that period, Ruth (as well as Orpah) also went without having children, despite her attempts to conceive with her husband. Instead, Naomi had no option but to return to her land and Ruth went with her, despite knowing no one else in that land and having no guarantee of a better life living with another widow. The story gives no indication of how much time elapsed between the death of Ruth’s husband and her marriage to Boaz, but this story reveals in the last chapter that this whole drama was keeping the fate of the Davidic line in suspense. Without their perseverance and the patience necessary to maintaining it, the Davidic line and all that came from David’s anointing and covenant would not have happened. Furthermore, the significance of what they did would not come to be appreciated until three generations later. Sometimes it takes many years for the full significance of actions to become realized.
The Kingdoms United and Divided
Those three generations later, David himself experienced plenty of waiting between the time Samuel anointed him to when he actually consolidated his rule over all of Israel. He did not actively contest the throne when Saul was alive, and for several years after his anointing he had to flee for his life from Saul. He would have to take refuge in caves and forts far from home, and for some time he even had to take refuge in the enemy kingdom of Philistia. All along, he was still preparing to be king through the development of his leadership and military skills and through facing tests of his integrity relating to Saul. Even after Saul died, David had to wait seven-and-a-half more years before all of Israel recognized him as king, and during those years he fought a war with most of Israel (2:1—5:5). He had to wait a long time to see the promises he received in his youth come to pass, but his fortitude, perseverance, and trust in God made that long wait pay off for him and for all of Israel.
In the subsequent split of the kingdoms, the non-regal person who stands out the most is Elijah the Tishbite. He acted as a prophet for the better part of Ahab’s twenty-two-year reign, if not for the entirety of it. Elijah’s perseverance in being a true prophet of God who stood against Israel’s idolatry and immorality required patience beyond imagination. Yet, his mission to the Israelites was necessarily diverted for a time as God sent him to Zarephath in Sidon. He had previously announced that there would be a drought in Israel that would end only at Elijah’s word (1 Kgs 17:1). He would only give that word three years later (18:1, 41–46). In the meantime, Elijah spent his time as a prophet living with a gentile widow and her son, ensuring their divine provision and even resuscitating the son. Though his main purpose remained the same, Elijah shows that sometimes periods of waiting are opportunities for pursuing a mission by other means.
Exile
The Assyrian and Babylonian exiles introduced the waiting for the Lord that would define many Jews for centuries to come (indeed, it would define the atmosphere of Jesus’s birth). The last group of Judahites to go into exile in Babylon had to wait more than a generation to receive Cyrus’s permission to come back (and even then, many did not return, preferring to live in Babylon or wherever else they had gone in the Diaspora). After the initial announcement, it would be over two decades before the temple was completed, during which the Jews needed prophetic motivation in the face of opposition (Ezra 3—6). This temple, though, was lackluster in appearance compared to Solomon’s. And in any case, they were in need of religious reform, lest they follow after the same sins that sent them into exile. Ezra would ultimately lead this reform over eighty years after the initial return to Judah. And it would not be until the next decade that Nehemiah restored the ruined walls around Jerusalem.
Yet, for all of this waiting and for all that was accomplished after long periods of it, much of significance remained unchanged for the Jews. For those who never left the land, the change from Babylonians to Persians merely meant a change in what foreign power would be their overlords. For those who returned, the promises they had heard in exile were far from fulfillment. Many had not returned, the ten northern tribes were still scattered abroad, reunion/reconstitution were still far off, exaltation was even farther off as the people returned to a smaller land, foreign powers still had ultimate authority over them, the kingdom of God and the Davidic return were nowhere in sight, and all of the grand visions announced in the prophecies of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and others seemed as far from current reality as they were when the prophets proclaimed them. No biblical text better catches this sense of anxiety mixed with hope than Dan 9. Daniel confesses the sins of the nation and repents, begging for God to forgive and to restore his people, the holy city of Jerusalem, and the temple on the basis of God’s mercy rather than any sense of the people deserving such restoration. He made this supplication because he perceived that the seventy years of punishment foretold by Jeremiah (Jer 25:11–12; 29:10–11) were at the point of fulfillment. Yet the angelic response he received to his prayer was that the seventy years were only the beginning of the Jews’ time in waiting. Seventy more “sevens” must pass in order to, “finish the transgression, put an end to sin, atone for iniquity, bring in everlasting righteousness, seal both vision and prophecy, and anoint the most holy place” (Dan 9:24). The interpretation of this timing, along with Daniel’s other vivid visions and the interpretations of them, ensured continued lively speculation about these prophecies into the time of Jesus and thereafter (e.g., Josephus, Ant. 10.266–268). In the meantime, the Jews had to figure out how to refocus on keeping the Torah and whatever else they thought was necessary for faithfulness to the covenant, hence a major motivation behind the diversification of Second Temple Judaism.
This theme of waiting for the Lord would shape the worship of many Jews through liturgical texts (Pss 25:1–5, 19–21; 27:13–14; 31:23–24; 37:5–9, 34; 38:15–16; 39:7–10; 40:1–5; 62:1–2, 5–8; 69:1–3; 130; Lam 3:25–33). Isaiah, probably the most influential biblical text for eschatological expectations, and some smaller texts would similarly encourage this theme of faithful waiting with the promise of reward for perseverance (Isa 8:17; 25:6–9; 26:7–15; 30:18; 33:2–6; 40:27–31; 49:22–23; 51:4–6; 60:8–16; 64:4; Hos 12:6; Mic 7:7; Zeph 3:8). And while Matthew’s Christmas narrative is the one with multiple clear quotations and even a list of generations to make clear his point of prophetic and covenantal fulfillment, Luke’s Christmas narrative is the one that best captures this ambiance of eager expectation and waiting that has continued from the OT. In fact, this ambiance comes into focus in the characters and speeches of Zechariah, Elizabeth, Mary, Simeon, and Anna.
Zechariah and Elizabeth
Zechariah and Elizabeth are like Abraham and Sarah in being well advanced in years before they have a child. For all of their efforts, all that they could do in the waiting was to be faithfully obedient to the commandments and regulations of the Lord (1:6). But sometime around the turn of the eras, God granted that they would not only have a son, but that this son would be the one who would finally prepare the way for the Lord at his coming. What Gabriel declares to Zechariah in 1:16–17 evokes promises that have been circulating for centuries concerning the salvation of the repentant remnant (Isa 10:20–22; 11:10–16; Jer 23:3–8; 31:7–40; Mic 2:12–13; 4:1–7; 5:7–9; 7:18–20; Zeph 3:11–13; Zech 8:11–23; 13:8–9) and the one who prepares the way for the Lord’s coming in judgment and salvation (Isa 40:3–5; 52:7; Mal 3:1; 4:5–6). In other words, the wait is not quite over, but here is the sign that it is nearly over. Elizabeth actually feels this more vividly when she encounters Mary and the baby John inside of her leaps for joy, then she calls Mary the mother of her Lord (1:41–45).
Zechariah caps off their role in the story by his celebratory response to John’s birth with the Benedictus. He evokes language and stories from Israel’s long history building up to this and the language of prophecies to paint the picture that what has been long awaited is now about to come to pass. The language of redemption evokes the Torah, the exodus, and hoped for deliverance (including in the form of new exodus). The statement that God has raised up a mighty savior from the house of David declares the return of the Davidic throne and the long-awaited fulfillment of the Davidic covenant (besides Mic 5, see Ps 132; Isa 9:1–7; 11; 16:1–5; 55:1–5; Jer 23:5–8; 30; 33:14–26; Ezek 34:23–31; 37:23–28; Hos 3:4–5; Amos 9:11–15; Mic 5:2–5a; T.Sim. 7:2; T.Jud. 24; T.Naph. 5:1–3; 8:2–3; Pss Sol 17 [especially vv. 21–46]; 4Q174/4QFlor 1 I, 11–14; 4QDibHama/4Q504 IV, 5–8). In fact, the mercy of the Lord’s coming is in fulfillment of promises made all the way back to Abraham and spoken most vividly through the prophets. He conveys his assurance of this fulfillment with the use of the futuristic/proleptic aorist for the verbs that apply to the future (1:68–69). These verbs have that futuristic/proleptic sense to them because the closing verses of 1:76–79 refer to what John the Baptist will do to prepare for this Savior. This language of prolepsis—that the wait is over in some senses and ongoing in others—would continue to shape the Christmas narrative, the Jesus narrative across the Gospels, and the Christian message after Jesus’s resurrection.
Mary
Unlike her cousin, Mary herself did not wait a long time for her child; she was still a young woman at the time she conceived. However, her Magnificat well captures the same ambiance of waiting that suffuses the rest of the Christmas story in several ways. One, it echoes the Song of Hannah (1 Sam 2:1–10) at multiple levels with the anticipation of what her pregnancy means for the people of God in general, albeit with the suggestion that this birth will be greater than Hannah’s. Second, its evocation of the theme of God exalting the humble and vindicating his servants at once recalls the exodus and the hopes surrounding the new exodus and salvation of Israel (1:50–54; Pss 9:11–14, 17–20; 10:1–4; 12:1–5; 14:6; 18:25–29; 22:26; 25:9, 16–18; 37:14; 69:30–33; 140:12; 147:6; 149:4; Isa 11:4; 29:19; 40—55; 61:1; Ezek 36—37; Joel 2—3; Amos 9; Micah 5—7; Zeph 2—3; Zech 9—14). Third, the use of the image of God’s arm as the means of salvation similarly recalls the exodus and expectations of God’s mighty saving action (1:51; Exod 6:6; 15; Deut 4:34; 5:15; 7:19; 9:29; 11:2; 26:8; Psalm 44:3; 77:15–20; 89:10–13, 21; 98:1; 136:12; Isa 30:30, 32; 33:2; 40:10–11; 48:14; 51:5, 9–11; 52:10; 53:1; 59:16; 62:8; 63:5, 12; Jer 21:5; 27:5; 32:17, 21; Ezek 20:33-34). Fourth, the closing of her song with reference to the covenant made with Abraham (1:54–55) also echoes the basis of hopes in the Psalms and prophecies for God’s climactic action (Pss 105—106; Isa 41:8–9; 42:1–2, 21; 45:4; 48:20; 49:3; 51; Jer 33).
As with the Benedictus, a noteworthy feature of this song is that all of the verb tenses in vv. 51–55 are aorist, although being concerned with future events, precisely because of the confidence Mary has that they will come to pass, particularly in light of Israel’s past story. Jesus is the climax of this story and this faithfulness and the one through whom the expectations come to fruition. The fulfillment of promises—the center of the covenantal relationship around which the human acts rotate and accrete—comes through Jesus. Judgment and justice come through Jesus. Mercy and the deliverance and faithfulness implied therein come through Jesus. The power of God to save, to judge, and to effect what he has promised are embodied in Jesus. Naturally, Luke is aware that all of these theological features were not completely fulfilled in the first coming of Jesus and he has an awareness of the promised Second Coming. As such, the way in which this song anticipates the Christmas event and—in the minds of Luke’s readers—points forward to the consummation of all things at his Second Coming perfectly fits the ambiance of Advent. Mary rejoices that she has already received a taste of these fulfillments before Christmas has even arrived. The aorist tenses also fit in this context given the confidence in future expectations based on past performance (a point that still rings true in the Advent season). It is a proper reflection of how Christians should react to these promises and Jesus’s fulfillment of them in the Advent season and outside of it, since eschatology properly colors all of Christian theology.
Simeon
Simeon appears on the scene once in 2:25–35 forty days after Jesus’s birth (2:23; cf. Lev 12) and then never again. He is a man looking forward to “the consolation of Israel” (v. 25). As proves typical of what Simeon says later in the text, this language is particularly Isaianic and is a way of describing the deliverance of Israel coinciding with the forgiveness of her sins (Isa 40:1–11; 49:13; 51:3–14; 57:18; 61:2; 66:11–13). His role in the story is as the witness who has been waiting his entire life to see the Messiah because he has received a promise that he would not die before seeing him. Such is another way of describing the eschatological event and hope he is looking forward to in that the Messiah is the Consoler who brings about the consolation of Israel. When he begins speaking (v. 29), he testifies that this eschatological hope that has defined the course of his life has come to fruition and that he now feels that he can be dismissed. After all, he has seen the means of salvation that God has prepared for his people (Isa 11:1–10; 25:9; 40:3, 5; 45:17; 46:13; 49:6, 8; 51:5–8; 52:7–10; 56:1; 59:16–17; 60:18; 61:10; 62:1, 11; 63:5), which is a light of revelation and glory to both Israel and the gentiles (Isa 9:1–7; 11:1–10; 42:1–9, 16; 49:6; 51:4; 52:10; 56:1; 58:8–10; 60). In this baby he manages to see a glimpse of the inauguration of the kingdom of God because he is seeing the inaugurator. At the same time, he realizes that the coming of the king is a divisive event that will reveal the true people of God and the rebels who will seek to resist him at each turn. This imagery evokes the rejected stone that becomes the cornerstone or capstone, the stumbling stone over which the unfaithful will trip, and the foundation stone on which the faithful will find themselves well established, being the foundation of the kingdom of God (Ps 118:22 [Matt 21:42//Mark 12:10//Luke 20:17; Acts 4:11; 1 Pet 2:7]; Isa 8:14–15; 28:16 [Rom 9:33; 1 Pet 2:7–8]; Dan 2:34–35, 44–45). Such statements prove to be true of Jesus’s ministry and his own words about the division created by the coming of the kingdom and its king as some rebel and some receive willingly. But as for Simeon, his whole life had built up to this one moment, it was the purpose for which he lived. Hence, he was content to be dismissed after he saw who he had waited his whole life to see. Of course, he realized that Israel would still have to wait for the baby to grow up, but he had at least received a peek of the one who would bring them salvation.
Anna
I have a disproportionate amount to write about Anna because I have done much research on this part of Luke for one of the few sermons I have done. Still, I think it is important to narrate this story in its fullness to appreciate how well it illustrates this theme in such a small place for a character who, like Simeon, appears once and then never again (2:36–38). Scholars debate how old she was at this time since the Greek phrase before “eighty-four years” (2:37) is ambiguous enough to suggest that eighty-four years is either her age or the length of her widowhood. I am inclined to think that the proper translation is that she had been a widow for eighty-four years, in which case her age would be closer to 105 years, since she would have married when she was around fourteen, stayed married for seven years, and then been widowed at twenty-one. I think this understanding is most likely the proper one because it would fit with the subject being either “she” (in which case “widow” would be the predicate nominative) or “her widowhood” and because the description of her seems to set up connections with Judith, who remained a widow from some undefined age until her death at 105 (Jdt 8:4–8; 11:17; 16:22–23). Either way, this woman is old by any standard. And because she spent most of her life as a widow, she would have been poor, vulnerable, and dependent. Though remarriage would have been understandable in her circumstance, it seems that her unwillingness to marry again illustrates how dedicated she was to being the wife of one husband and how dedicated she was to serving the Lord, even though it would mean becoming more vulnerable to possible deprivation.
Her actions in the temple complex, which she had been performing for tens of thousands of days to this point, further demonstrate this devotion. While one might be inclined to think of Anna’s actions at the temple to be standard religious practice, there is more to this picture. Prayers and fasts dedicated to the God of Israel were among the emphasized practices of Jews in this time to distinguish themselves (cf. Matt 6:1–18). The particular acts also fit with the theme of waiting for the Lord in anticipation. They functioned as supplications to God to acknowledge that something was wrong about the situation of the people (Isa 58; Zech 7:3–5; cf. Zech 8:19). Even as fasting was ritualized, it retained its characteristics of signifying urgency, submission, self-denial, and desperate desire for God’s action.
Given her age, one can also discern the character of the historical background of her devotion to waiting for the Lord. The Hasmonean Dynasty was not all it was hoped to be, it was not the fulfillment of biblical promises. In the 100 years or so prior to the Christmas story, Jewish leaders oppressed their own people, engaged in civil wars with Pharisees and Sadducees on opposite sides, and left thousands dead in their wake as the leaders fought to consolidate their power. The one exception was Salome Alexandra, who ruled from 76 to 67 BCE. The Jews enjoyed a time of relative peace under her reign. But after she died, it was a straight decline until the Roman general Pompey took over a weakened kingdom in 63 BCE and Rome began ruling through client kings. Living conditions were not necessarily worse under the Romans and some adjusted to the new rulers, but messianic hopes were renewed and eagerness increased for God’s deliverance and fulfillment of promises for new exodus, establishment and prosperity of Israel, judgment of enemies and the unfaithful, vindication of the faithful, covenant renewal, and the return and rule (or kingdom) of God. Overall, they sought the assurance of the oft-repeated promise that they would be God’s people and God would be their God. Anna had lived and waited through all of these things.
As the text informs us, Anna was a true Israelite by birth. This genealogical information is usually uninteresting to readers today, but it does tell us something important. As an Israelite, her heritage consisted of the stories of Scripture and her inheritance consisted of the promises of God proclaimed in Scripture. She heard these stories and promises growing up in her home, in synagogue each week, in the festivals each year, and in other ways besides. All of her life, she had been told that this story was her story, that this God was her God. And from those stories and promises, it became clear that waiting for the Lord was an intrinsic part of faith. She heard it in the stories I noted before, other stories like that of her namesake Hannah waiting for a child, and in texts throughout Psalms, Isaiah, Lamentations, Hosea, Micah, and Zephaniah. The fact that she was a prophetess puts her in rare company in the history of Israel, but she still had to wait expectantly and tirelessly like everyone else.
Because she is a prophetess she sees and she knows that this baby is the one who will fulfill all her hopes, all the promises on which she had relied for the years of her long life. She saw the purpose of her entire life contained in this one sight, all of it had built up to this one moment. The words of thanks that she had desired to speak for years on end finally burst forth from her lips. But that was not all she had to say. With new life coursing through her, she had words to proclaim—though they are not recorded for us—concerning this baby and the hope he brought to all who were looking for the redemption of Jerusalem. This phrase, “the redemption of Jerusalem,” is a pregnant one that evokes all the great promises in the Prophets, focused as they often were on God’s kingdom extending out from Jerusalem. It is a parallel to the earlier phrase, “consolation of Israel,” and is in fact a synecdoche of it in light of the fact that the destiny of Jerusalem was a central aspect of Israel’s eschatological hopes, as can be seen especially in the passages about God’s “return” to Zion (see in particular Isa 40:1–11; 51; 52:8–10). What she has to say is not the full gospel yet, but she had good news to proclaim because of the hope that God revealed to her.
John the Baptist and Jesus
Even as John the Baptist and Jesus themselves were the ones for whom the whole story of Scripture has been waiting, they too would have to wait until their proper time to do what they lived to do. Both were around thirty when they began their public ministries and all the time before that was but preparation summarized by the text in the broadest of terms (Luke 1:80; 2:52). It is impossible to say what they knew when, but surely there came a time when they confronted the weight of their purposes and still had to wait for the proper time to carry out those purposes. Some people, especially ministers, like to rush headlong into what they believe is their calling, but take less consideration for the necessary preparation. But both of these men had to wait well into adulthood. Technically, they had to wait until near the ends of their lives. Jesus had two to three or so years of ministry after waiting around thirty to get started. John probably did not last even that long. As such, they spent 90% or more of their lives in growing up and in preparatory waiting.
Waiting in the New Covenant
While Jesus came to inaugurate the kingdom of God and to die and rise for the salvation of the world, his Ascension and the promise of the Second Coming ensured that waiting for the Lord would remain an essential aspect of faith, albeit with a transformed understanding of its center. After the Gospels, this theme does not tend to take narrative form (unless one counts the prison stays of undefined length in Acts). Typically, this theme appears with key vocabulary, such as ἀπεκδέχομαι (Rom 8:19, 23, 25; 1 Cor 1:7; Gal 5:5; Phil 3:20; Heb 9:28), ὑπομένω (Matt 10:22; 24:13//Mark 13:13; Rom 12:12; 1 Cor 13:7; 2 Tim 2:12; Jas 5:11; 1 Pet 2:20), and ὑπομονή (Luke 8:15; 21:19; Rom 2:7; 5:3–4; 8:25; 15:4–5; 2 Cor 1:6; 6:4; 12:12; Col 1:11; 1 Thess 1:3; 2 Thess 1:4; 3:5; 1 Tim 6:11; 2 Tim 3:10; Titus 2:2; Heb 10:36; 12:1; Jas 1:3–4; 5:11; 2 Pet 1:6; Rev 1:9; 2:2–3, 19; 3:10; 13:10; 14:12). The first word has the sense of “expectant/eager waiting,” which makes it especially appropriate for the context of Romans 8, where it has almost half of its NT appearances in reference to believers. The second and third words are related in that the latter is the noun form of the former. The NT authors use these words in reference to perseverance through trials and obstacles. It is determinative action that both produces hope and is sustained by hope (Rom 5:4; 8:25; 15:4; 1 Thess 1:3). Three texts are of particular interest here: Rom 8, Heb 11:1—12:3, and Revelation in general.
Romans 8 serves as a climactic vision of Paul’s magnum opus. In the previous two chapters, Paul paints a picture of what it means to be a Christian, to be dead to sin but arising to new life through identification with Jesus by the presence of the Spirit. In Rom 7 he describes the conflict that takes place within the Christian because of his or her dedication to Jesus as Lord. But, symphonically, the note introduced earlier and preserved as an undertone rises to a crescendo with Rom 8 with its proclamation of victory for the Christian who participates in the victory of Christ (and who embodies this pattern of victory in baptism). While Torah could not ensure such a victory due to the weakness of the flesh, God provided a sure way to victory through the resurrection and subsequent indwelling presence of the Spirit. This Spirit links so closely to Jesus that Paul once calls him the Spirit of Christ (and indeed the one who belongs to Christ signifies that he/she belongs by having the Spirit of Christ). This Spirit represents the eschatological promise and life which Jesus inaugurated, imbuing the believer with new life now in anticipation of the day when God will grant full resurrection life to the believer. Furthermore, the language of the Spirit as indwelling the believer alludes to language of the temple, indicating that Paul sees believers as the new temple and thus that the new exodus and all of its attendant promises have come to be—at least in an inaugurated sense thus far—in the work of Christ. Christians are to live consistently with these realities by persevering in the struggle between present suffering and future glory. The eschatological sequence has only begun, but because of what happened to Jesus and the presence of the Spirit as a result, believers can have confidence that they will be co-heirs with Christ through participating in his life, death, and resurrection.
This understanding of the present age in light of the future inheritance most poignantly demonstrates the importance of the theme of waiting in vv. 18–27. Here, Paul declares that the Christians wait with all of creation in eager anticipation of new creation, the consummation of the proleptic reality in which they live now through the Spirit. All of creation has a vested interest in what happens to the Christians as the image bearers of the perfect human being and of God. Whenever humans serve their divinely ordained function, creation can fulfill its function as one half of the marriage between heaven and earth. Humans have some agency and participation in the new creation by the will of God. Creation will enjoy the consequence of the deliverance of the children of God and their announcement as such (which must involve the redemption of their bodies through resurrection). Until that time of its exodus, it waits, groaning as in childbirth. Believers share in this groaning through prayer in the Spirit. This metaphor is crucial to grasp in Paul’s thought—as well as in the thought of the rest of the New Testament writers—since new creation is in a birthing process, having already begun, but not yet complete. The sufferings of the present are part of those birthing pains. This point follows the pattern of the many statements of the divine necessity of the crucifixion and resurrection, the former entails the latter according to God’s plan. It also follows the pattern of waiting with perseverance, potentially for an entire lifespan, for a goal that God has promised for a long time. Hence why Paul closes his discourse with an extended meditation on the sovereign faithfulness of God, working through all situations for his good purposes. In all parts of this process of foreknowing, predestination to the conformation to the likeness of Jesus, calling, justification, and glorification, one sees God’s inexorable righteous will and love. Nothing can stand against it. In case anyone wishes to accuse Paul of wishful thinking, he re-emphasizes his basis for this conviction in a historical event: the death and resurrection of Jesus (8:34). By participating in Christ, Christians share in that conquest, even if the fruit of that conquest takes a long time to reap.
Hebrews 11:1—12:3 is an extension of the subject introduced in 10:19–39, which is itself the practical outcome of 6:13—10:18. The audience of Hebrews has faced suffering for the sake of faith. Much like in Rom 8, these believers endure their suffering because they know that whatever they lose in this life they will receive far greater in return in the age to come. The author summarizes his message in this section and transitions into the next section when he writes, “But we are not among those who shrink back and so are lost, but among those who have faith and so are saved” (10:39). Chapter 11 thus features the names and stories of their predecessors who shared this same faith and also had to overcome obstacles in their perseverance. Each of them had the assurance of things they hoped for by the promise of God, but none of them received the fullness of what they waited for, they only received the portion of a down payment. Each of them had the evidence of things not seen yet by looking at the action of God elsewhere, but none of them saw the greater reality behind God’s initial promises, except from a distance. The theme of waiting is more of an undertone in this chapter, rising to greater prominence only in a few places (11:10, 13–16, 26) before the conclusion of this recap and the transition to ch. 12: “Yet all these, though they were commended for their faith, did not receive what was promised, since God had provided something better so that they would not, apart from us, be made perfect” (11:39–40).
But contrary to popular opinion, the so-called “Hall of Faith” in Hebrews does not end at the end of ch. 11. It ends at the beginning of ch. 12 with the crowning member. The race of faith that the audience of Hebrews and their predecessors run is the same one that Jesus ran as the pioneer and perfecter of the faith. He is the consummate faithful one, the one who is the proper heir of all of God’s promises. It is only by his allowance that the faithful share in that inheritance and share in the common faith and the common waiting for the common goal. This passage, more extensively than any other, shows the long tradition of waiting that characterizes salvation history. But ultimately it shows the end of that waiting in the context of Christian discipleship, in which “the Lord” has been reconceived in light of the coming of Jesus. And because of this, as the author looks upon the one who scorned the shame of the cross to receive the exaltation to the right hand of God’s throne, he sees a reason not to shrink back or to lose heart. He sees the ultimate demonstration of God’s faithfulness and why waiting for the Lord is always worth it in the end.
Revelation most thoroughly interweaves this theme throughout the course of the book. As it stands, the audience of the book is experiencing temptations to fall away (2:4–5, 10, 14–15, 20–24; 3:1–2, 8, 15–18) and tribulations of conflict with the world outside the assembly (particularly with the powerful; 2:2–3, 9–10, 13–15, 19, 24; 3:8–9), yet John informs them that there will only be more of the same temptations (12:10–11; 13:15–17; 17:1–2, 4, 8; 18:2–5, 23b; 19:2; 21:8, 27; 22; 22:15) and tribulations (6:9–11; 7:13–14; 11:3–13; 12:10–12; 12:17—13:18; 15:2; 16:5–6, 12–16; 17:6, 9–14; 18:20, 24; 19:2b; 20:7–10) for them and for all of the saints in the days to come. The temptations included abandoning love, shrinking back in the face of trials out of self-preservation, participation in the idolatry of the day, sexual immorality, an unspecified but deadly lack of vigilance and diligence, and buying into worldly delusions of grandeur and wealth while losing true grandeur and true wealth. The tribulations included conflicts with false apostles, Nicolaitans, false Jews/synagogues of Satan, false prophets, the cults and their practices, the two great beasts, demons, the great whore of Babylon, and the devil himself with outcomes such as unfaithfulness in some cases and impoverishment, imprisonment, and death in other cases. In the face of these challenges, the proper response of believers is to keep the commandments of Christ (2:26; 3:3, 8, 10; 12:17; 14:12; 16:15), to remain faithful until death so that they will receive life on the other side of death (2:10, 13; 17:14; cf. 12:11), and to persevere through all tribulations and temptations (1:9; 2:2–3, 10, 19; 3:10; 13:10; 14:12). In other words, the proper response of the faithful one is active waiting for the Lord.
The theme of waiting is even subtly present in the statements about the millennium (20:4–6), which, regardless of one’s particular perspective on the millennium, is ultimately meant to give way to the climax of the everlasting new creation. But to get to that new creation, the exalted believers still have to wait actively through the millennium.
The reason for this emphasis throughout the book is because this book, more extensively than any other New Testament work, lays out a vivid vision of Christian hope. The story told by the book is that things will get worse before they get better, but absolutely will get better because God will consummate his victory. In fact, John describes the outcome of perseverance and faithfulness in terms of victory (2:7, 11, 17, 26; 3:5, 12, 21; 12:11; 15:2; 21:7). The believers gain this victory on account of their perseverant faithfulness is itself a participation in the victory of God in Jesus (3:21; 5:5; 12:11; 17:14). Nowhere is victory terminology more prevalent in the New Testament than in Revelation. But to realize the fullness of that victory that they already possess and to participate in the consummation of the kingdom of priestly kings that God has made them (1:6; 5:10; 20:4–6; 22:5), the believers must act in anticipation of that future and they must wait.
Conclusion
In these many texts that tell us about waiting for the Lord, and how this waiting is an essential dimension of faith, we see also the essence of Advent. In Advent we find ourselves a part of this same story at the intersection of remembrance and hope. We look back to Jesus’s first coming, but we also look forward to his Second Coming. Advent crystallizes this characteristic of faith. In this time between times, we are called to wait for the Lord, to wait with trust, loyalty, obedience, and perseverance. Our waiting is to be an active waiting, anticipating and preparing for God’s action by proclaiming what he has done. We may not live to see our Lord’s coming again on earth. I am not privy to that knowledge, and neither is anyone else. But the Lord should find us at work anticipating his return, living as he has told us to live, because we have confidence, through his resurrection, of the new creation that we are waiting for. The wait may seem interminable, but these stories show us that there is never a point in life at which we can discount God’s faithfulness coming through in ways we have not conceived before. Waiting for the Lord is an intrinsic characteristic of faith in our Lord, but because it is for the Lord, that waiting is never in vain.