Learning the Grace of the In-Between
There is a peculiar temptation in November to begin rushing.
Perhaps it is the weather. The leaves have mostly finished their great autumn performance and are now lying about the lawn like actors who have forgotten to leave the stage. The daylight disappears with alarming enthusiasm. Christmas decorations have begun appearing in shops with the subtlety of a brass band entering a monastery.
And the Church, meanwhile, is doing something rather unfashionable.
It is waiting.
We have stepped out of the great procession of saints — apostles and martyrs, reformers and teachers, holy women and holy men, the famous and the forgotten — and now we are walking toward the final Sunday of the Church year, when we will proclaim Christ as King.
But we are not there yet.
And perhaps that is precisely the point.
The Spiritual Problem of “Not Yet”
Most of us are reasonably comfortable with beginnings.
We like beginnings because beginnings come with plans.
New jobs have orientation packages. New diets have grocery lists. New exercise programs have expensive shoes which, for approximately three weeks, make us feel astonishingly athletic.
We are also reasonably comfortable with endings.
Endings give us something to mark. We have graduations, anniversaries, retirement dinners, funerals, closing hymns and occasionally cake.
Christians are particularly good at cake.
It is the middle that causes trouble.
The middle is where we cannot quite see what God is doing.
The middle is where prayers have been offered but answers have not yet arrived.
The middle is where one chapter has clearly ended but the next chapter has not quite introduced itself.
The middle is where we ask God for a road map and receive instead something resembling a small lantern.
Enough light for the next few steps.
Which is terribly inconvenient.
I should personally prefer divine guidance to arrive as a detailed itinerary, preferably laminated, with estimated arrival times and clearly marked rest stops.
God, however, appears stubbornly committed to faith.
Scripture Is Full of People Waiting
Once you notice it, you discover that much of Scripture happens in the in-between.
Abraham receives a promise and then waits.
Israel leaves Egypt and wanders through wilderness.
David is anointed king long before he actually becomes king.
The prophets speak of restoration while standing among ruins.
Mary hears the angel’s extraordinary announcement and then spends months carrying a promise she cannot yet hold in her arms.
The disciples watch Jesus ascend and then wait for Pentecost.
Even Holy Saturday stands between the cross and resurrection.
Apparently, God does some of God’s finest work in places where very little appears to be happening.
We would like God to hurry things along.
God seems more interested in making us ready.
And those are not the same thing.
The Saints Knew Something About This
Perhaps that is one of the lessons we carry with us from the season of saints.
The saints were not people who always knew what came next.
They were people who learned to trust God when they didn’t.
We sometimes remember saints as though they walked through life beneath a permanent shaft of stained-glass sunlight, serenely certain of everything.
They did not.
They worried.
They doubted.
They became tired.
They misunderstood things.
Some made spectacular mistakes.
A surprising number argued with bishops, kings, emperors and one another.
Which, depending upon your experience of church meetings, may actually make them considerably more believable.
Holiness was not certainty.
Holiness was faithfulness.
They kept praying.
They kept loving.
They kept serving.
They kept putting one foot in front of another when the destination was not yet visible.
And perhaps that is what holiness usually looks like.
Not heroic certainty.
Simply faithful persistence.
Christ Is King Before We Get There
We are walking toward Christ the King Sunday, when the Church will make its great proclamation that Jesus Christ is Lord.
But here is the wonderful thing.
Christ does not become King because we eventually reach the feast.
Christ is King now.
In the middle.
In the uncertainty.
In the unfinished story.
In the prayer whose answer we cannot yet see.
In the relationship still being repaired.
In the grief that has not yet softened.
In the decision that has not yet become clear.
In the church wondering what faithful ministry will look like tomorrow.
In the world that often appears to have misplaced both its compass and the instruction manual.
Christ reigns here too.
That may be one of the deepest truths of this strange little stretch of November.
The sovereignty of Christ is not merely the promise waiting at the end of the road.
It is the presence walking beside us along it.
Perhaps Nothing Is Wasted
There are seasons when we look at our lives and wonder whether anything is actually happening.
We pray.
We wait.
We try.
We fail.
We begin again.
We make coffee.
We answer emails.
We attend meetings that could almost certainly have been emails.
And occasionally we wonder whether any of this is advancing the Kingdom of God.
Perhaps more than we imagine.
Because God is remarkably economical with grace.
Very little is wasted.
The conversation that seems insignificant may plant a seed.
The kindness nobody notices may become someone’s lifeline.
The prayer that feels unanswered may be changing the person praying it.
The season that feels empty may be creating space for something new.
The road that seems to lead nowhere may quietly be teaching us how to walk with God.
We tend to measure life by visible accomplishments.
God seems to measure it by faithfulness.
And those measurements are rarely identical.
The Grace of Today
Perhaps the spiritual invitation of this in-between season is wonderfully simple.
Stop trying to live tomorrow.
Today has enough grace for today.
There will be another season.
Advent will come.
Christmas will come.
Another year will begin.
There will be plans and surprises and blessings and interruptions and probably several things we confidently predict that will turn out to be completely wrong.
But none of that is ours yet.
What we have is today.
This November day.
This breath.
This prayer.
This neighbour.
This opportunity to forgive.
This chance to encourage someone.
This meal to share.
This moment in which Christ is already present.
And perhaps discipleship is simply learning to recognize that presence.
God Is Already Here
We stand between the saints and the King.
Behind us are the witnesses who remind us that faithful lives matter.
Ahead of us is the proclamation that Christ reigns over all things.
And here we are, somewhere in between.
Which may be exactly where God intends to meet us.
Not once everything is resolved.
Not once we understand the plan.
Not once the next chapter finally begins.
Here.
In the unfinished sentence.
In the unanswered question.
In the ordinary November afternoon.
In the holy inconvenience of waiting.
Because the Christian hope has never been that we will always know where the road is going.
The Christian hope is that we know who walks it with us.
And sometimes that is enough.
Enough light for the next step.
Enough grace for today.
Enough courage to keep walking.
The saints discovered it.
The Church has proclaimed it for centuries.
And soon, at the end of another Church year, we will say it again:
Christ is King.
But until then, perhaps we can learn something equally important.
Christ is here.
And if Christ is here, then even the in-between can become holy ground.
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Companion Prayer
God of the waiting places,
we confess that we are often in a hurry
to arrive somewhere else.
We want answers before questions have finished their work,
certainty before faith has learned to walk,
and resurrection without spending much time in the waiting.
Teach us the holiness of the in-between.
Give us enough light for the next step,
enough grace for this day,
and enough courage to trust that you are working
even when we cannot yet see what you are doing.
When the road ahead is uncertain,
remind us that Christ is not merely waiting at the destination.
Christ is here.
Walking beside us.
Meeting us in the ordinary.
Making even unfinished places holy.
Help us, like the saints before us,
not always to understand,
but always to remain faithful.
For you are the God who was,
and is,
and is still to come.
Amen.