What Are We Waiting For?

So many people waiting – waiting for hope, waiting for healing, waiting for life, waiting for an opportunity to make a difference, waiting to obey, waiting, waiting, waiting.  In John 5 is the story of a man who had been crippled for 38 years.  He was waiting.  He was waiting for the water of the pool of Bethesda to be stirred so that he could pull himself into it and be healed.  Later N.T. manuscripts insert that an angel came once a year and stirred the water.  Regardless of how this event happened this poor man found himself continually too late.  The very event he waited for was not able to help him.  Yet,  according to the laws that govern God’s creation, the event of the stirring of the waters served a supreme purpose of pointing to the One healer,  to Christ Himself. 

From John’s narrative it doesn’t appear that the crippled man even knew Who was speaking to him.  Jesus asked Him, “Do you want to be healed?”  Immediately the man offered an excuse of why he was not healed,  “I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, and while I am going another steps down before me.”  Unfortunately this is true for many of God’s people today.  They are waiting for an event, a stirring of the waters when all the time Christ Himself is standing right there.  How many wait for a change of their circumstances, the next great church service, a new pastor, the restoration of a child, before they finally obey Christ and enter the life God intended them to live.  How long will God’s people look to an event while God waits for them to look to His Son?

Believer, think of the life we find when at Christ’s command we take up our bed and walk.  Think of His ever present help and companionship, His life giving presence in our daily walk.  Let’s not wait for an event, let’s encounter life, let’s encounter Christ!  What are we waiting for?