Waiting.

 That infamous verb which, so often, doesn’t feel like a verb at all.

 We all experience phases of waiting in our lives—some short and some very, very long.

 Whether its waiting in line at the grocery store, or waiting in bed for sleep to overtake us, or waiting for results at the doctor’s office, or waiting (and then waiting some more) for Mr. Right to finally pop the question.

Some waits are sprinkled with gleeful anticipation, others marked by the anxious clenching and unclenching of fists…but really, either way, we so often see waiting as synonymous with inconvenience. And so, we are quick to curse the waiting, quick to waste it on self-pity.

In these moments, when the beauty and meaning in our waiting feels lost, thrust away into the abyss of our impatience, we can turn to the example of our Mother Mary for inspiration.

Her waiting was done on the back of a donkey as she traversed thousands of miles of wilderness leading her father and farther from home with each step. Her waiting was done in the quiet of her heart as she pondered the promise of suffering spoken to her by a prophet. Her waiting was done in an upper room, amidst the trembling and woe of her Son’s disciples as they mourned His death. How beautifully Our Lady waited!  She waited, even in the difficult moments (especially then), with a heart full of patient acceptance and unyielding trust, entirely expectant that God would bring His promises to fruition.

 Her example fortifies within us the hope that God can use our waiting, and sometimes even intends it, for our betterment. Yes, perhaps there is a gift meant for us in the waiting, a deeper sweetness brought upon by the reception of something that has been longed for and sought after; perhaps there is a growth in the waiting that widens our capacity to receive.

Perhaps that’s why Mother Church, in her wisdom, has set aside the glorious season of Advent. Contrary to the belief of popular culture, these precious weeks leading up to Christmas are not meant to merely be lumped as one into this holy day. These weeks are meant as a time of waiting. And unlike many of the other periods of waiting in my life, I have always found Advent to be a time of joyful anticipation…I truly love the feeling of building excitement as each week and each candle brings us closer to the celebration of Christmas.

But really, what would that joy be, or would it even be, without the wait?

 Of course, our sweet Jesus does not ask us to give of something which He himself has not given—we can draw comfort, too, in His examples of waiting—for 40 days in the desert, in agony in the silence of a garden, for nine months in the womb of His mother. Such is the beauty of the Incarnation for which we prepare this Advent, that our God Himself was willing to experience waiting and the weight it could beset upon the human heart.

So, my sisters , as we prepare to enter this season of waiting, let us not be dismayed. May we take immense hope in knowing we are not alone or un-thought of In our waitings, whatever they may be. And may we run quickly into the arms of the One who still patiently awaits us in the tabernacle, for even as He pursues us, He waits for us to come.

 Come, let us adore Him.

Love+Blessings,

Faith

Purple was my least favorite color as a child.

In a method of rather superstitious means, I found a way to convince myself that the color purple brought me bad luck. I always seemed to be wearing purple when sickness struck. The purple candy never tasted the same as the other colored candies. And the purple piece in every board-game was definitely jinxed. It’s no surprise then, that the outside of my Jesus Box was dark purple with a light purple stripe around the top.

The inside, no doubt – was also purple.

Although my Jesus Box did not actually have material form, in my imagination it was as real and purple as it gets. It was also battered and stuffed into the very top of my closet, secured like most shoeboxes with a few rubber bands around the outside to secure its contents. I never exposed the inside of this box to the light for fear the contents would pour out and ruin my life. Sometimes I pretended the Jesus Box wasn’t there. Other times, I forgot about it (usually when I needed it the most).

If you haven’t guessed the secret to this imaginary shoebox, you should know that the Jesus Box held all my fears.

It began by the suggestion of my mother one day when I confided to her the overwhelming nature of one of my fears. As a small child, my fears would likely make most adults smile. Did I worry what the first day of preschool was going to be like? Yes. Was I fearful of getting sick? Yes. Did I dread the orthodontist’s impressions and the constant gagging that would entail? Yes.

But in looking back, I realize that my fears grew in proportion to my maturity. Like the rest of humanity, as I grew, the realities of life grew with me. Instead of fearing preschool, I worried about my first day at college or my first job interview. I worried that my unborn baby sister wouldn’t make it. I feared the move from one part of the country to another, leaving behind all family and friends. I worried that I would witness someone die. I feared an unknown future. 

It was always the same routine, no matter how old I was: my mom would find me sitting on the side of my bed late at night, unable to sleep, with one or more of these “unknowns” weighing heavily on my heart. The thing that I feared would usually be something I could do nothing about. Mom always reminded me of this, asking, “Is there anything you can do to about it?” And the answer would be “no”. There was no way I could save my baby sister’s life. . . no way I could make sure our move to St. Louis would be full of lonliness… no way I could prevent someone who was terminally ill from dying. No way I could ensure that I would not be 30 and still single. (ha!)

“Then put it in the Jesus Box,” Mom would say. “If you’ve done everything you can do, this is not in your control. It’s in God’s. Your job is to give it to Him  – put it away in the Jesus Box. He will either make that which you fear go away or help you endure it when the time comes.”

Mom was right. When placing my fears into the “Jesus Box” I made a rule of never being able to take the fear out again for another look. It was an all or nothing practice for an all or nothing person. I’m either going to hold on to something I cannot control or completely give it up.

I’ve changed over the years – and my imagination has too. At the age of 30, I was forced to face one of my worst possible fears. For weeks, I wrestled with the unknown, trying to give that which was out of my control to the loving hands of God. I remembered the Jesus Box one night and began to unearth the old friend for another go at giving up.

But when I found my Jesus Box, I was surprised to notice that it wasn’t purple anymore. And wasn’t battered or torn.

My Jesus Box was beautiful. Like an unearthed treasure, it was brilliantly golden and solid. It begged to be taken down from the top of the closet and displayed in place of honor. And when the lid was removed, the contents did not spill out like I always thought they would. They were gone. Our Lord had taken everything I had placed inside over the course of my life and had addressed each and every fear, removing some completely and preparing me to live through others. I wasn’t really living my fears after; I was facing them with the strength of another Heart much heartier than mine.

The presence of fear will likely never change within me, but my view of God’s care for them has. The box is no longer ugly to me; it is a treasury of love and trust, waiting to take my fears and turn them into something.

My Jesus Box is no longer purple.