Tuesday, November 1, 2011

'Tis the Season... almost!

Well, I did my best to hold off on this post as long as possible, but now that it's November, I think I can safely say that I am already getting very excited about Christmas! As far as my reason for being excited about Christmas, I think the blame can be placed squarely on the shoulders of David Crowder. In case you had yet to hear the news, he and his band came out with a Christmas album this year, and it is quite spectacular. It was a bold marketing move on their behalf to come out with it at the beginning of October, but it seems to have worked on me! Even though there are no original songs, there are some wonderful arrangements of some Christmas classics, so it is definitely worth checking out.
For fear of this simply becoming an album review, I will move more toward what this post is actually intended to be. As I have begun to think more about Christmas, and with my current theme of waiting, I have begun to focus on the people of Israel, who spent thousands of years waiting for the events of Christmas. From the time of the fall, the promise of a Savior was something that this entire nation of people longed for and desired more than anything. Through captivity in Egypt, wandering through the desert, finally getting to the promised land only to spend generations warring with their neighbors, demanding a king from God, the kingdom being split in two, another period of captivity, a string of prophets who could not get through to the people, then finally a period where God fell silent, the people of Israel were constantly longing for the gift they had been promised from before God even established His covenant with Abraham. They had ritually been sacrificing for years, longing for the day when God would provide the ultimate sacrificial lamb: His only Son, the perfect a blameless Lamb who would set all men free from the grip of sin.
But what happened? The nation of Israel, in large part, missed the gift that God designed specifically for them. Over the years, their ideas of what God would do for them through His Son had gotten warped. They had allowed their own desires to get in the way of what God had provided: an example of how to live a life, freedom from sin, and a chance to have the broken relationship with God made whole again. So, as we head into this Christmas season, it is my prayer that we do not do as the Israelites did and get so caught up in our own expectations of what Christmas is that we miss what it truly is: God coming down to us, giving His Son so that He could restore the brokenness in all mankind. Oh, and enjoy some pretty spectacular Christmas music!

Thursday, October 27, 2011

Waiting on the World to Change

Well, now that I know I have at least three people reading this blog, I guess I have to stay committed to it for my faithful followers! So here we go with post number two, only two days later! Not bad, if I do say so myself! Sorry about all the exclamation points, guess I'm just excited about this whole thing...
So since this blog is supposedly about waiting, I have been more conscious of the word in my every day life. Today, it just so happened that they played John Mayer's song "Waiting on the World to Change" on the radio while I was at work. As I listened to this song, I realized that the message of it is kind of a big downer. To prove my point, here are the lyrics to the song:

Me and all my friends
We're all misunderstood
They say we stand for nothing and
There's no way we ever could

Now we see everything that's going wrong
With the world and those who lead it
We just feel like we don't have the means
To rise above and beat it

So we keep waiting
Waiting on the world to change
We keep on waiting
Waiting on the world to change

It's hard to beat the system
When we're standing at a distance
So we keep waiting
Waiting on the world to change

Now if we had the power
To bring our neighbors home from war
They would have never missed a Christmas
No more ribbons on their door
And when you trust your television
What you get is what you got
Cause when they own the information, oh
They can bend it all they want

That's why we're waiting
Waiting on the world to change
We keep on waiting
Waiting on the world to change

It's not that we don't care,
We just know that the fight ain't fair
So we keep on waiting
Waiting on the world to change

And we're still waiting
Waiting on the world to change
We keep on waiting waiting on the world to change
One day our generation
Is gonna rule the population
So we keep on waiting
Waiting on the world to change

We keep on waiting
Waiting on the world to change

Now, I have heard this song dozens of times, but I have never really put much thought into what the song actually meant. As I listened and read through the lyrics, I could not believe how negative it truly was. Now, I do not know whether or not John Mayer was being sarcastic or not, but it seems to me like he has given up. It seems as though he has been utterly defeated, recognizing that he does stand for something, yet there is no point in standing for what he believes, because it will not make a difference.
As wonderful as this song is, I do not think the message of it could be further from the truth. If we stand around and wait for the world to change rather than doing what we can to make a difference, the world would be a much different place. There are so many people from my generation that are currently changing the world through sticking by their beliefs and being proactive in making the world a better place.
I know that John Mayer was not coming from a faith based perspective, but I believe our generation of Christians are doing so much to live out their faith in a real and practical way. I know of countless people that I was friends with in college that are currently changing the world through working with students, serving God on the mission field, leading worship, or even simply taking the time to invest in their marriages. As Christians, it isn't necessarily the big things that change the world, but it is doing the little things that we have been called to faithfully day in and day out. If we really want to change the world, it comes down to living your life day in and day out with the resolve that you will stick to your beliefs and doing the little things right. If every Christian would stick to their beliefs without compromise, I think we would see the world become a much different place. So, in response to you John Mayer, I would like to say that I am not waiting: I am doing what I can to change the world now rather than letting it simply run its course.

Tuesday, October 25, 2011

A New Beginning... maybe...

Well, as I'm sure anyone who will actually read this will know, this is not my first foray into the blogosphere. I have now tried on many different and various occasions to begin to put my thoughts out here into cyber space, with little to no effectiveness. So, as I begin this journey once more, I do so with no great confidence in myself, but we shall see where this heads. Who knows, I may actually find the time to keep up on this and to make an actual go of this. So, with that said, here we go... for now.
As I thought about what this blog could be titled/about, it seemed like waiting would possibly be the best thing I could write about. You know what they say, write what you know. And, believe me, I know about waiting right now. It seems like in every area of my life, there is something I am waiting for at this point. I know that so much more detail will come as I delve into each area, so I will spare you snippets of what will come in future posts. For now, I will write about the largest and most obvious thing I am waiting for right now: my wedding day.
On May 19th, 2012, I will officially become Mr. Luke Henry. (Ok, so that's a joke and a reference to when Andy Bernard asked Angela to marry him on the Office. Sorry if you don't get it.) But anyway, in less than 7 months, I get to stand in front of a crowd of witnesses and promise to love, honor, cherish, provide for, and support Lauren LeeAnne Cox for the rest of my life. I know it will be a great day that I will not forget for the rest of my life, but at this point, it still seems so far away. It feels as though I have been waiting forever, and I know that I am so ready to be with her and begin the rest of my life.
For those of you who may not know, ever since we started dating, Lauren and I have gotten to spend very limited time together. We are from the same hometown, have gone to the same church for years, and actually live less than 3 miles from each other. However, since we started dating, she has been in college, so our time actually spent together has been very limited. As a result of this, it has made the time we have been able to spend together in person very special, and has allowed us to become very skilled at communicating as best we can over the many months we are apart, but it makes the waiting until each time we are together still seem like an eternity. In fact, it has only been 2 days since we were last together, but it seems so much longer than that.
This weekend, we had the blessing of being together here because she was home for fall break. It also happened to be her birthday, so that made the weekend extra special. We spent as much time as we possibly could together, but it still seemed to be entirely too little. I guess it is these glimpses of what is to come that can make the waiting all that much harder. I get to spend a weekend here and there with her. I get to hold her hand, open her car door, talk to her face to face, but never for more than a few days or weeks at a time it seems. I know that God's timing is perfect, but it is times like this past weekend that I wish He would just speed time up for a little bit! But, I think that also can be part of what makes waiting hard: wishing it away never works. So, here I am caught in the middle of a conundrum: I don't want to have to wait anymore, yet I know that waiting is where God has me, so I have to try to make the best of it. So I do my best to occupy my time with things that I know will improve our relationship when we do finally get to be together. I have worked on trying to keep things in order, trying to eat healthier, involving myself more with other Christians so that we can have a place to grow in our faith as a couple, and doing my best to develop a personal schedule that will be easy to carry over into our marriage.
But, as I look at Lauren and my story, I cannot help but see a bit of the story of God in it. From time to time, we as Christians here on earth get a glimpse of what is to come: a view into the future, when the bridegroom comes for His pure bride. We see this, and we wish for nothing but the day to come when we can be with Him. Yet, He calls us to wait. He gives us the glimpses to remind us that there is something better than this waiting in store, yet we are left in waiting. So we wait. We do our best to work on our long distance communication as best we can: we read, we pray, we go to church. We long for the day when waiting is no more and unity is all we know. But, is there more that He wants from us? Are we simply called to wait here, or are there things He would have us do in the waiting that would make the time pass faster and make His return even more glorious? Are there things we can do now that can make our eternal "marriage" even better when the waiting is finally over? I believe with all my heart that there are so many things I can be doing better, both as I head into my earthly marriage, and as I step toward the "marriage" of the Church to the great bridegroom. So, in this waiting, may God always guide me to do the things that make Him happy and that will better both of the most important relationships that He has put me in.