December 22, 2002 sermon by Todd Rogers

Thinking Outside the Box is a phrase I find myself using pretty frequently. It means developing unique ideas or solutions that are not the typical answers you might expect from the average person. For example, suppose you are driving along in your car on a wild, stormy night. You pass by a bus stop, and you see three people waiting for the bus:

1. An older lady who looks as if she is about to die.
2. An old friend who once saved your life.
3. The perfect man (or) woman you have been dreaming about.

Which one would you choose to offer a ride to, knowing that there could only be one passenger in your car?

You could pick up the older lady, because she is going to die, and thus you should save her first, or you could take the old friend because he once saved your life, and this would be the perfect chance to pay him back. However, you may never be able to find your perfect mate again.

How about giving the car keys to the old friend, and let him take the lady to the hospital. Then you could stay behind and wait for the bus with the woman of your dreams.

Many times it’s the question itself, that puts us into the box (Which one would you choose to offer a ride to) automatically narrows the choice to one person and places you in the driver seat. When we think outside the box, we don’t have to always accept the parameters that are given in the question. We can always rephrase the question!! In doing so we allow ourselves to get outside of the box.

In today’s scripture reading we are shown how God works outside of the box in the story of Zechariah and in the history of Israel. Both have been in a period of long waiting. Israel has been waiting for a Messiah for hundreds and hundreds of years. Zechariah and Elizabeth have been waiting for a baby for all of their lives.

Folks are any of you good at the waiting game? I know I’m not! We live in the age of cell phones, pagers, email, high-speed internet connections, electronic organizers, all of which allow us to minimize our waiting. I can’t stand waiting for people who are late, for my daughter to hurry-up, my parents to understand, for my sermon to come together, or for the table at the restaurant to be ready. I even get frustrated while waiting in the express lane at the grocery store. At times when I’m really stressed I become the self-appointed guard of the express lane and start counting the number of items in other people’s carts. You wouldn’t believe how many law-breaking express lane shoppers there are. One of these days I’ll get the courage to say, “I’m sorry sir, but you have 13 items and this is a 10 item or less lane.”
Well it’s pretty clear that our culture wants things fast and it wants them now. Immediate gratification is our rallying point. We have drive through banking, drive through dry cleaning, drive through oil changes, drive through car washes, and drive through fast food. What’s next…drive through work, drive through relationships, drive through parenting, and drive through life?

Waiting as a spiritual discipline for us is something that is definitely outside of the box. One pastor suggested to me that a time of waiting is usually viewed unpleasantly because we believe that when we change our circumstances things will get better. We live life thinking that if we could just get that raise, that new job, or that new car, home, or special someone, then our circumstances would change and things would get better. Life becomes a series of obstacles or events that we just have to get through and waiting is perceived negatively because it is seen as a delay to changing my circumstances. God calls us to learn to be content while we wait. The expectation of a new child is something that Laura and I have been excited about since May. Not once has the doctor said, “Why wait? Let’s go ahead and deliver the baby early so you can be happier sooner.” Whether it be a 15 year old waiting for a driver’s license, a couple waiting for the date of their wedding, a little child waiting for Christmas, or a family sitting in the waiting room during the surgery for a loved one we all have to wait and for most of us it’s not easy.

The real spiritual issue is not should we wait, but more importantly, how do we wait. Now if we use the model of a waiter or waitress I think we get an insight as to how God wants us to wait. Because the wait staff at a restaurant’s primary purpose is to serve customers by listening well and anticipating well. They have to hear what you want, and how you want it. They have to expect when drinks will need to be refilled and how long until the food comes out. A good waiter never hovers over the table, nor does one expect the food to serve itself. A good waiter waits expectantly and serves at the appropriate times.
Back when the telegraph was the fastest means of long-distance communication, there was a young man who applied for a job as a Morse code operator. Answering an ad in the newspaper, he went to the address that was listed. When he arrived, he entered a large, noisy office. In the background a telegraph clacked away. A sign on the receptionist’s counter instructed job applicants to fill out a form and wait until they were summoned to enter the inner office. The young man completed his form and sat down with seven other waiting applicants. After a few minutes, the young man stood up, crossed the room to the door of the inner office, and walked right in. Naturally the other applicants perked up, wondering what was going on. Why had this man been so bold? Within a few minutes the young man emerged from the inner office escorted by the interviewer, who announced to the other applicants, ‘Gentlemen, thank you very much for coming, but the job has been filled by this young man.’ The other applicants began grumbling to each other, and then one spoke up, ‘Wait a minute! I don’t understand. He was the last one to come in, and we never even got a chance to be interviewed. Yet he got the job. That’s not fair.’ The employer responded, ‘All the time you’ve been sitting here, the telegraph has been ticking out the following message in Morse code: “If you understand this message, then come right in. The job is yours.” None of you heard it or understood it. This young man did. So the job is his.’”

Not long before his death, Henri Nouwen wrote a book called Sabbatical Journeys, in which he wrote about some friends of his who were trapeze artists, called the Flying Roudellas. They told Nouwen that there is a special relationship between the flyer and the catcher on the trapeze. This relationship is governed by important rules, such as “The flyer is the one who lets go, and the catcher is the one who catches.” As the flyer swings on the trapeze high above the crowd, the moment comes when he must let go. He flings his body out in mid-air. His job is to keep flying with his arms held straight out and wait for the strong hands of the catcher to take hold of him at just the right moment. One of the Flying Roudellas told Nouwen, “The flyer must never try to catch the catcher.” Because if the flyer tries to catch the catcher he ends up flailing his arms reaching for arms that aren’t even there yet, which makes it much more difficult for the catcher to catch him. The flyer’s job is to wait in absolute trust. The catcher will catch him, but he must wait expectantly.

Friends the scripture tells us that Zechariah was praying to God that his old barren wife Elizabeth would conceive and bear a son. Now that’s a kosher prayer if I ever heard one. You see the Hebrew scriptures are chockfull of stories of old barren women conceiving…Sarah conceived Isaac at age 90, Rebekah conceived Esau & Jacob in her old age, the same thing happened with the conception of Samson, and when Hannah conceived Samuel. It’s interesting that we use the word barren to describe both women who are without a child and to describe regions such as deserts or wastelands because they are without life. The message of today’s scripture is clear…God brings new life where there is barrenness. So folks let’s get outside of our boxes, by learning to let go and wait. Because God will catch us, and God will bring new life to the barren areas of our existing lives. As you gather with your families this Christmas, instead of asking, Did I get what I wanted for Christmas this year, let’s ask What does God want for Christmas in me? What does God want for Christmas in me?

And God calls us to wait expectantly because when we wait we are not simply just doing nothing…when we wait we are allowing our souls to mature. So lets get outside of our boxes and instead of asking the most frequently asked question at Christmas, which is "What do you want for Christmas?" Instead let’s change the question and ask, what does God want for Christmas in me? What barren areas in my life am I to wait expectantly so that God can bring about new life?