Romans 11:25-27
25 I want you to understand this mystery, brothers and sisters, so that you may not claim to be wiser than you are: a hardening has come upon part of Israel until the full number of the gentiles has come in. 26 And in this way all Israel will be saved, as it is written,
“Out of Zion will come the Deliverer;
he will banish ungodliness from Jacob.”
27 “And this is my covenant with them,
when I take away their sins.”
One of the biggest struggles that I think many of us have is how we respond to our expectations. Whether conscious or unconscious, all of us create narratives of how we think that our life will go. Even as a child, I remember making plans in my head of how my house would look when I grew up. While not a clear picture, I pictured on a certain timeline of when milestones might happen. We all do this and then through the course of life, and not always through welcome occurrences, we learn that life has other plans for us. For example, we often picture ourselves in retirement with plans of quiet time of freedom or with years of healthy travel and adventure. When these plans don’t happen for one reason or another, the emotional piece can be challenging to accept.
Through the waiting of the Israelites we can learn from their story what waiting and expectations is all about. Many waited their whole lifetimes for a savior only to pass before that happened. Many pictured a very different messiah than the one that arrived. The bible story doesn’t always clue us into the emotions that they felt but we can imagine that they ran the gamut: frustration, peace, patience, disappointment, hurt and even gratitude. In all our waiting and expectations, we can learn that the world happens in God’s time and we can’t always know the reasons for why things happen as they do. Of all the things in life we must learn, I think this is one of the most challenging. And, yet we are called to be faithful and allow the hand of God to take our own through all the twists in the road. The one thing that God always promises is that God will continue to be faithful to us. And, indeed, God is always faithful and never doubts to be a source of love.
Prayer
God of endless love, we often create our own expectations of what we want to happen in our lives and the world. Help us to know that no matter what comes our way that you are always faithful to us. You love us completely to the ends of the earth. In Jesus Name, Amen.