I know what I'm longing for, so I'll wait.

I made matzo the other day. I want to share Communion weekly with Stuart during Lent, so I made matzo last week in preparation. In my definitively un-kosher kitchen, with my thoroughly gentile hands I mixed together some flour, salt, olive oil and water in a glass bowl. I rolled it out paper-thin on my Mexican-made table. I pierced it properly with a fork. I baked it till it bubbled and browned on my handy pizza stone.

I made matzo last week, because I wanted to bring something of myself to the Lord's table this week. An offering created from my own time and effort. I enjoyed the experience. 

I'll buy the grape juice.

I wrote an order of service for our shared meal. Now, I'm all ready to wait. All ready to wait in the season of Lent as we pray and fast. Ready to contemplate the big themes of life and death. Sin and redemption. Sacrifice and obedience.

Growing up near the coast of southern Connecticut, our family spent countless days on the beach. I've walked miles upon miles on sandy coves and rocky piers, gathered a hundred pailfuls of pebbles and sea shells, jumped through a thousand plus waves crashing to the shore. Give me a blanket and a coastline and I could wait for hours contemplating life and love within earshot of the ebb and flow of the tide.

To smell the salt air, to hear the crashing of the waves, to feel the spray of the sea on my face brings a sense of belonging no other place on earth provides for me. I can wait on the beach. I can relax. I can breathe. It's there I long to remain. To wait for one more wave to crash in. 

Just one more.

Ebb and flow. The beach reminds me of the importance of rhythm in our lives. Its consistency, its constancy stabilizes me. The tide comes in. We wait. The tide goes out. We wait. We know what we long for, so we wait. 

For those of us who allow the liturgical calendar to dictate our seasonal rhythms, we notice that the Church Universal spends much of its time waiting in pregnant expectation. In Advent, we wait with hope for our Savior's birth. In Lent, we wait with ashes for our Lord's resurrection. In the days before Pentecost, we wait together for the promised Holy Spirit. We know what we long for, so we wait.

When ordinary time finally arrives, when the consistent ebb and flow of waiting and celebrating, waiting and celebrating, waiting and celebrating finally ends we may think: alas, the waiting is over. Except, it isn't. In reality, even in what we call ordinary time, it doesn't take long to remember that the Church remains in a persistent state of waiting for the blessed hope. 

Still pregnant. Still waiting. Still hoping.

The tide is still out on the final great expectation. But, in eager expectation, I'll grab my blanket, head for the coast and I'll keep a weather eye on the horizon. 

I know what I'm longing for, so I'll wait.

All Saints Day

Throughout church history, believers have honored the memory of saints and their sacrifices on this day. Lesbia Scott, loving mother and wife of an Anglican priest wrote I Sing a Song of the Saints of God for her children to commemorate their memories.

We sang this song in the Episcopal Church when I was a child. I always loved it and in fact, we made a special request to have it sung on the day of Wesley’s baby dedication.

The song reminds us that saints come from every walk of life; their lives are a testament to their faithfulness, an example to follow.

Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us. Hebrews 12:1

I sing a song of the saints of God,

Patient and brave and true,

Who toiled and fought and lived and died

For the Lord they loved and knew.

And one was a doctor, and one was a queen,

And one was a shepherdess on the green:

They were all of them saints of God—and I mean,

God helping, to be one too.

They loved their Lord so dear, so dear,

And his love made them strong;

And they followed the right, for Jesus’ sake,

The whole of their good lives long.

And one was a soldier, and one was a priest,

And one was slain by a fierce wild beast:

And there’s not any reason—no, not the least,

Why I shouldn’t be one too.

They lived not only in ages past,

There are hundreds of thousands still,

The world is bright with the joyous saints

Who love to do Jesus’ will.

You can meet them in school, or in lanes, or at sea,

In church, or in trains, or in shops, or at tea,

For the saints of God are just folk like me,

And I mean to be one too.