When Time Races & Crawls

On waiting and receiving and waiting and receiving and waiting...

Jan 01, 2024

It’s been a long time since I sent an edition of The Goodness to your inbox. I checked today thinking perhaps I’d missed a month. Somehow I missed three.

I watched American Symphony the other night, the documentary about Jon Batiste. He received 10 Grammy nominations on the same day his wife, Suleika, an author, started chemotherapy for leukemia. At the time he was also writing a symphony. And touring. And keeping up his nightly gig as bandleader on a late night talk show. At the end of her five-week hospital stay for a bone marrow transplant (during which time her most recent book sat on the NY Times bestseller’s list), Suleika asks her mother (and presumably Batiste as he’s in the room but silent), “Does it feel like it’s been five weeks?” And her mother, packing for the trip home, says, (something like) “Five weeks, five hours, five years, five days… it’s like time doesn’t exist.”

And that is how it is when things are very hard and when things are very good, when you’re waiting or receiving, but especially when you’re waiting and receiving (both at once). Every day stuffed with more blessing than any person could properly sort—surely it’s been more than five weeks. No downtime, no rest, no normal rhythms—surely it hasn’t been five weeks. And also, from the patient’s perspective, wellness still just beyond her reach, a few watercolor paintings the only evidence of passing time in this fluorescent white box—five weeks? Not five days? Or five years?

Praise God I do not have leukemia, and praise God I have not been nominated for ten Grammys—though I hope I would accept either with peace and perseverance. No, I’m just swept up in a life that grew more quickly than I expected, and at the same time I’m waiting with open hands for projects to find their ending and promises to find their keeping.

In the last three months many beautiful things have unfolded. I’ll tell you about them, because they bring me joy, because God’s presence lives inside them like a flame inside a lantern.

In September Justin and I traveled to Clarksville, TN for a dual Storied Family and Storied Marriage weekend. We brought our girls up on stage to answer questions from parents. I wasn’t sure how that would go; I conceived of it as frosting on the cake of content. But this was more. Love and grace spilled all over everywhere as hungry parents asked question after question after question, and London and Eve responded with empathy and wisdom and hope. It was one of the most powerful expressions of the Holy Spirit I’ve ever encountered.

In September I traveled with Justin to Houston where he told the story of Ruth and Boaz at a marriage conference. He asked me to tell a story from our marriage in three pieces, and together we’d braid a layered truth. I told the story of a time we’d misunderstood one another, a time when marriage seemed like a commitment to keep accidentally hurting each other. It was a story about stumbling forward together, about the way love grows when we hold hands in the valley. We held hands a lot that weekend. Mostly in the sunshine.

In October my new bestie, Kelly, and I drove to Colorado Springs for the 24/7 National Prayer Gathering. We called it Holy Spirit Camp. We prayed for hours each day. One day we prayed on a train climbing Pike’s Peak. Carried to the summit, no effort of our own—it felt right. We ate donuts at the top. On the last night of the gathering Tyler Stanton told a story about a time he banked everything on his understanding of God’s promise, and I was called back to a promise God made me and inspired to put my weight on it.

Later in October Justin and I would partner with friends to put on the first ever Storied Family Camp in the middle of nowhere, Texas (a monumental task). The teaching sessions were good and true and helpful—I’m so thankful to God for that. But it was something else that made the weekend soar. It was parents partnered with their kids to practice what they’d learned. At the end of the weekend we had families share the results of their family quest ( a series of story-rooted challenges for them to overcome together). They stood in front of us beaming, holding a flag decorated with their family mascot, a sword labeled in Sharpie with their family superpower, and a staff to remind them of their roots, and with one confident voice proclaimed their story-rooted identity discovered together.

/ This past week we heard that a girl from Storied Family Camp had been baptized. When our friends (and camp partners) saw her little sister at the church just before her sister’s moment of dedication and rebirth, her eyes lit up. She said, “Remember our quest?!” /

Also in October, a Halloween party for the college small group we lead, family Halloween costumes because our girls still insist upon them and I an too overjoyed at their desire to be a team to deny them anything (we were conspiracy theorists), and a trip to a professional recording studio where Eve recorded three songs she’d written—one so singable and fun that the whole family sang the chorus. We couldn’t help it. Oh—and visits from faraway friends, a hike in the rain, and a photography mentorship for London.

In November I flew to Florida to attend a wedding, one of those weddings that seems like the kind of happy ending (happy beginning) you never could have imagined a year ago in the darkness and mess of heartbreak. I danced with my cousins in the sand as the sun set over the Gulf of Mexico.

The next week my husband and I drove to Dallas to surprise our daughter with a concert—her favorite artist—to celebrate her sixteenth birthday. Sixteen?! The concert was electric; our daughter’s smile, a marquee. We drove home the next day—18 hours of driving for two hours of pure joy. Entirely worth it.

And then we hosted what seemed like everyone we know as friends descended on NW Arkansas to attend Justin’s Holy Ghost Stories Live show in a magical chapel in the woods. We all worked so hard (every single member of my little family) that we don’t actually remember what all we did—only the magic of God’s stories carried on the back of a rising cello, light gilding its wings.

And then we drove to Huntsville, AL and Nashville, TN and did it all again—two new stories, new musicians, Eve singing, me hosting and managing, Justin leading and creating and telling, London running the merch table, and Yahweh’s same old faithful love.

Somewhere in the middle of everything that happened in those three months I wrote a book. And designed a cover. And formatted the book. And consulted with editors. And almost published the book.

But then didn’t.

Not publishing the book was also a kind of achievement/mountain summit/challenge.

And now I’m home and taking deep breaths.

So you can see how these three months might feel like three years and also somehow three days.

But then there’s the waiting. Nothing throws off my sense of time like waiting.

My heart is racing. My knees are weak. My stomach has dropped. Every part of my body does not want to do what I am waiting to do. I look to my left and say to my husband, “Why am I doing this? I am a forty two year old woman with nothing to prove.”

Why am I waiting in line to ride a roller coaster?

He says to me, “You only have to feel this way once.” He means, once the rollercoaster starts, I’ll be fine. I’ll love it. I’ll be fine for the whole day if I can just endure this fifteen minutes of nervous waiting. I look at my girls, excited, giddy, so happy I’m here. Deep breaths…

Sitting on the tracks after a 2 minute ride that felt like 14 seconds (all exhilaration and delight) I tell him, “If I can just learn to endure the waiting…”

I’m fasting today. That’s not a flex. Christians fast. It’s like saying I’m praying or I’m reading my Bible. Normal Christian life. So I’m fasting. I’m fasting, because I’m waiting for God to keep a promise. I think it’s a promise. I might be wrong. I’m open to being wrong, but I don’t think I am. I’ve been waiting a few months now for an answer to a question, for provision for a plan. The plan seems God-authored and God-stamped. I ask, “Yahweh, when are you going to do what You’ve said You’ll do?”

The longer I walk with God the more comfortable I become waiting for Him to answer. And somehow also more uncomfortable?

I’m sure He’s heard me. I’m sure He’ll answer eventually. I’m sure the roller coaster will be worth the painful wait. This confidence has cemented over time. Faith grows.

But still, What’s He waiting for?

Victor Hugo said, “Waiting is life.” My husband asks, “Is that the same as Life is waiting?” I say, No. Because not all of life is waiting. Lots of life is living, receiving, going, doing, racing. But waiting—we can decide waiting isn’t real life, just the space in between to-dos, the not-living, breath-holding blanks.

Of course, if we think that we’re wrong.

Back in October when Tyler Stanton shared that story at the National Prayer Gathering, it hit with a power and resonance I can’t explain—I just felt a deep, echoing SAME. It was a story about waiting for God to do what God had promised to do, and wow, I have so many of those stories. I once waited for 23 years for God to do what He’d promised to do. The things I’m waiting for now—12 years, 3 years, three months.

Tyler said the scariest thing about the wait wasn’t that maybe he wouldn’t get what he wanted (that he could handle), it was the possibility that God might not do what He’d said He’d do. Tyler prayed, “I’m afraid of losing you, God, because if I lose You I’ve lost everything.”

That’s it. That’s the scariest thing about waiting: What if He doesn’t come through this time? What does that mean about us?

I said to a friend this past month, “Here’s what’s so scary about living a long life of ever-growing faith: Every day you build more on the foundation of your trust in Yahweh. Eventually you’ve put everything there, because you truly, truly trust Him with it all. And life is good and beautiful because you have this all-in integrity of faith. But also, you are ALL IN. If Yahweh isn’t good, if Yahweh isn’t faithful, if Yahweh isn’t, EVERYTHING comes crashing down.”

Everything is a lot to lose. But none of it is so devastating as the thought of losing Him.

The word “wait” appears 17 times in the Psalms:

Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord. (Psalm 27)
We wait in hope for the Lord. (Psalm 33)
Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him. (Psalm 37)
Lord, I wait for you; you will answer, Lord my God. (Psalm 38)
I wait for the Lord, my whole being waits, and in his word I put my hope. (Psalm 130)
I wait for the Lord more than watchmen wait for the morning. (Psalm 130)

Why so much waiting for the Lord?

Perhaps because waiting is soil. Things grow in it…

And perhaps because waiting is a single glass of wine—something to slow the pace, to make us thoughtful and engaged.

Waiting is an invitation to a second kind of living, an opposing partner to going, receiving, having…

During this time of fasting time passes slowly. Hunger draws my attention to the length of a minute, an hour, a day. It will be a long time before I eat again. So says my rumbling stomach, my weak legs, and my lonely mouth.

During this time of fasting I grow reflective. I pray. I ask questions. I read Scripture. I read my life. I feel the longings inside me. I share them with God.

I say to Him, “I need you.” I list all the ways I need Him. I put flags on hills: Come here. Come now.

But as I mark the hills, I cannot help but notice, some are inhabited already. Flowers bloom. Grass grows. He’s here.

And so the waiting helps me see. I pray, “I see you. Thank you. Praise you.”

It’s in the waiting where I discover and catalogue the gifts, the whole list of gifts I’ve named above, three months smeared with glory, but also two whispered answers. They come on different days. Both require unwrapping.

First, a friend calls and says yes. An unexpected yes. A yes that makes no sense. We have no way to make the yes happen, but the miracle of the yes makes me believe in the sure-to-come miracle of provision. I have waited for this. It’s not the answer I expected in the way I expected. But the waiting, this particular waiting, is done. Gift received.

Then, my husband comes into the bathroom with a list, numbers jotted on an envelope. They make me nervous. I have been avoiding listing numbers while I wait for there to be enough numbers. He has, too. But today, in this twilight between the end of the year and the beginning, he’s felt compelled, like God was saying now is the time to count. And when he counted, lo and behold, enough.

He tells me there’s enough as I brush my teeth.

Here I was waiting, and the gift had already arrived.

Sometimes waiting is what motivates us to check the porch.

God kept His 23 year promise this year, too (the one I mentioned earlier). That answer has made this year the best year of my life so far. Praise Him. He is faithful.

The wait was long, and it’s hard to call it good because mostly it sucked. But it was good. It was soil. And lo and behold I’m more like Jesus for having been planted in it.

Waiting is good like exercise is good. Like studying is good. Like plowing and weeding. The sweat is good. The growth is good.

Receiving (succeeding, achieving, harvesting) is better than good. But maybe it’s better partly because the wait magnified the intensity of the arrival, helping us receive with attentive minds and grateful hearts.

Waiting is life.

Receiving what we’ve waited for is life.

One slows time—the days before Christmas, unwrapped gifts under lit tree limbs. One speeds it up—hands moving, paper flying, blurred pictures.

Sometimes when I think about Heaven, that home for which we all long, the great wait, I wonder how to understand the concept of eternity. It just seems so long. But then I remember that Heaven is a new thing, a wait-less experience of time. Heaven is forever receiving—Christmas day, every day, all the glory unwrapped, the table set, every good thing available, an unending harvest, and the presence of God, never hiding, never veiled, always, fully here.

-JL

Happy New Year, friends! I hope this essay leads you into thoughtful reflection in this beautiful season of liminal light. I’m praying your 2024 waiting would be productive and your receiving would lead to God’s glory!