Sermon texts: Jonah 3:1-10, 1 Corinthians 7:29-31, Mark 1:14-20
The game developers have figured out a new and innovative way to keep us playing their video games. It’s a new strategy, a new technique, that they’ve incorporated into nearly every new and popular title that’s come out recently: They make you wait.
Really! That’s their plan. They make you wait. For instance, in my World of Warcraft game I have to build up my garrison to continue the game. It takes something like 2000 resources to do that, but I only get about 100 or so a day. So I’ll spend the next several days waiting. My new starship in my online Star Trek game took three weeks or so days to get, since I could only farm so many of the resources needed for that each day. I can only play about five rounds of Bejeweled Candy Blitz Saga before I have to wait until tomorrow (or pay more money. My choice.)
A wise man once commented that the old school video games from yesteryear are a lot like life. They get harder and harder until you die. Now the new ones reflect another unpleasant aspect of life. They make you wait.
I hate waiting.
I know, I’ve heard it all about how patience is a virtue. But there are just some things in life no one wants to wait for. The sunny vacation in the Bahamas? Who wants to wait for that? That brand new car? Who wants to wait for that? That hot date with your beloved? Who wants to wait for that? These are things we want now. We’re kids on December 1st, hungry for and eager for Christmas to get here. Darn it, why do we have to wait?
Life is hurry up and wait. And yes, while we say that patience is a virtue, I disagree. Patience is a necessity, but that doesn’t mean we have to like it.
We are not alone in that. I spoke last week of how God is often surprising and unexpected. What you say if I told you that God is surprisingly impatient? He wants things now too and doesn’t want to wait for them. That’s certainly the feeling I get from all three of our Scripture texts today. God is a hurry. He’s in a “terrible rush,” as our friends in Britain might say. But what is he in such a hurry for?
Well, to answer that, let us look at texts with some detail. We’ll begin with Jesus. We’ve heard this story before. It’s the tale of Jesus going by the seashore to call his first disciples. Today we have Mark’s take on those events, which contributes to our sense of urgency. Mark shows us a certain hurriedness to Jesus’ mission. Jesus hits the ground running and doesn’t stop until he’s done.
“And immediately...” Biblical scholars tell us that if we’re reading a mystery Bible text and it has copious uses of the word “immediately,” it’s a safe bet it’s from the Gospel of Mark. Jesus never catches his breath. Everything that happens seems to happen immediately after the previous thing. It’s like Mark is scripting an action movie version of the Gospel with a rapid pace and a level of excitement. But behind that excitement is a certain impatience. Jesus has an important job to do here and he wants to get it done.
These fisherman disciples are part of that important job. Think about for a second. If you want to get a task done quickly, one good strategy is to share the load, to bring in others to help you. In a lot of ways, that’s what Jesus is doing here. The world needs to know his message. The world needs to know him and if he just does it all by himself, it’ll take forever.
Ain’t nobody got time for that.
Some thirty years later, we see one of Jesus’ disciples (admittedly not one of those at the seashore) still at it. Paul writes to the church in Corinth and he’s lost none of that urgency. Look, he tells his audience, salvation is nearer now than it was before. It’s coming soon. We’ve got to get this done. We’ve got to tell people about what God is doing, what he’s done. The whole world needs to know and know now.
Hurry up. Get busy. There’s only a little bit of time left.
But what is it that God is in such a hurry to do? What is it that he is so eager about that he just can’t wait anymore? Jonah holds that answer. His story is also one of rushing and hurry. Get to Nineveh. Of course, we all know that story too. Jonah’s not quite as eager as God is and he takes a boat going the other direction, spends some time in the digestive tract of a large sea creature, and then gets barfed up on the Assyrian coastline. But once all that’s done, God comes to him again with this hurried message. Go to Nineveh and tell them. Jonah does, the city repents, and then God gets to do what he’s wanted to do all this time. What he always wants to do. What he hungers to do for everyone.
He shows love and mercy.
The things we are impatient about are the things that excite us the most. The things that excite us the most are things about which we feel the strongest, that we care about, that we are passionate about. No one is impatient for the doldrums of life. We’re impatient for the thrills, the pleasures, the best things that our lives offer. The things we love. The people we love. God is like that too.
He’s impatient because he loves us. And he’s so very eager to show that love. He wants to forgive. He wants to bless. He wants to embrace. He wants us. We are what gets God excited. He’s impatient to be with us. That’s what he hungers for. That’s what Jesus’ mission was about, to bring us together. Us and God. God and us. That’s what salvation is. That we are with him and he with us. That’s what he wants. That’s what God desires most. And he hates waiting for it.
I remember when Sarah and I were dating. We were a long distance couple. She was here in York and I was in the mountains of WV and we would to see each other twice a month or more as we could. I remember how much I looked forward to those times, how impatient I was for her to get to me or me to get to her. Those sorts of moments still happen even now that we’ve been married for almost 7 years. They happen because I love her. They happen because I want to be with her. And if God feels anything like that...well. who am I kidding? God feels something infinitely greater than that for all of us. No wonder he’s impatient. He loves us beyond reckoning. He wants to be with us. And that’s what Jesus came to make happen. And through his life, his cross, and his empty tomb, he made it so. Amen.
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