Monday, December 22, 2008

Waiting For Godot, or Anybody

It's late and I'm stuck waiting; the hour is late, but not enough for sleep. It's not yet Christmas, only Advent: a classic anticipation. The new job is accepted, but not able to be started.

So we wait, as if for Godot, wondering what it all means, or if it has any meaning.
Estragon peers out into the audience and comments on the bleakness of his surroundings. He wants to depart but is told that they cannot because they must wait for Godot. The pair cannot agree, however, on whether or not they are in the right place or that this is the arranged day for their meeting with Godot; indeed, they are not even sure what day it is. Throughout the play, experienced time is attenuated, fractured or eerily non-existent.[7] The only thing that they are fairly sure about is that they are to meet at a tree: there is one nearby.

In our culture, only instant gratification is rewarded; having to wait, developing patience, long-suffering, trust in the Divine Providence are all things that are looked down upon or discouraged. Only the slow, stupid, or poorly connected have to wait; the clever and the powerful can leverage their own way out.

The Christian knows in his heart that God is most powerfully alive, carefully attendant to his every need (Mt 6:27), and is able to bring good out of suffering (Job). So in these final days of Advent, remember the admonishment of Paul (Rom 8:18): "I consider that the sufferings of this present time are as nothing compared with the glory to be revealed for us."

Father knows best. Really.

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