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Christmas Countdown 2019….Day 17

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Part of the deal with Advent is that we are commemorating what it felt like to wait for Messiah the first time and we are also living in the tension of waiting for His return. 

I don’t wait well. 

When I know something is coming up I have an odd mix of extreme hyper-organization and intense procrastination struggles. 

I battle a growing list of items I jot down that I know will need to be done while handily doing the most ridiculous tasks that I have put off forever and will have no impact on the upcoming event.

Case in point. 

In one week it will be Christmas Eve. 

We will have two of our children here in our home and they will need clean beds to sleep in and foods that they like and can eat available. Our whole family will gather for an evening meal and gift opening, stockings and general silliness. 

The requirements for all of this to flow are things I have been doing for 30 plus years. I know exactly what has to happen in the next five days to pull it off. 

But this morning I spent a half hour filing receipts from the drawer where we stuff them when cleaning out purses and wallets each week. 

I am talking receipts dating back to May. 

I think this is human nature and while I can think of some highly organized friends who do not struggle with the same issues I do, they also get distracted in their own way from keeping the main thing the main thing. 

They just look neater and more efficient doing it. 

In Chapter 17 today Jesus tells us about how we are and why we need to help each other keep our focus on this waiting and watching and being prepared process that makes up our daily walk of faith.  

In the closing verses, Jesus gives examples of how we will be going about our every day tasks when He returns.  

He talks about the times of both Noah and Lot. 

In those accounts from the Old Testament we know that while the angels literally seized Lot and his family to get them out of Sodom, the rest of the town (including his son-in-laws) laughed at him and kept on keeping on. 

As Noah herded representatives of the entire animal kingdom into the ark and God shut the door, the people outside were just doing what they had always done. 

And so we wait. 

We wait for the fulfillment of the promise that He is coming back but we live in a world where we have to put food on the table and raise our families to function until He does. 

So we remind each other often of what really matters and how the things the world is getting all worked up about are temporal. 

We strive to embrace what God purposed for us in our time here and yet not hold it too tightly. 

How are you at waiting? 

If you are like me, come on over and help me get these papers filed and then we can start cleaning out the pantry…

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