They waited for us, and we wait for those coming

http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/020419.cfm
Hebrews 11:32-40
Mark 5:1-20

These two verses are tricky to decipher:

Yet all these, though approved because of their faith,
did not receive what had been promised.
God had foreseen something better for us,
so that without us they should not be made perfect.
(Hebrews 11:39-40)

Yes, a very difficult string of words to take in. This four-phrased pondering pack of words from Hebrews, though, provides a critical compliment to a very difficult problem for Christians who work hard in this life and yet get chastised for their allegiance to God. To help us grasp the important point being made by verses 39 and 40 I’ve selected as a bookend another great though also convoluted verse, Chapter 8, verse 28 from Romans. 

And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.

Both of these verses start out to say something and then add something else; just enough distraction to turn our heads around. You could say it’s frustrating, but it’s better, I think, to address the problem of the language with an analogy.

Consider these scripture fragments as hash browns on a breakfast plate. Reconstructions of leftover logic. These verses resemble half-baked potatoes recooked into something tasty. They're still potatoes, but now more attractive to the palate. Most revealing, hash browns, no matter how fancy you fix them, are still not the key part of a breakfast meal. Potato dishes don't make a menu. Similarly, seldom would anyone come up to you and recite either of those verses in order to begin an argument. No. They would come up after some other conversation had taken place. These verses get added to a main course. 

“You want hash browns with that?” You see, there’s a “that,” the more important thing, and then there’s the hash browns. Hash browns are good, but they’re complimentary to the eggs, sausage, and bacon.

The “that” of all scripture is Jesus Christ, the central figure in human history and the one who reveals to us the Father, and then sends us each the Holy Spirit. The Holy Trinity of God is the eggs, bacon and sausage of breakfast. Scriptures are full of side dishes that compliment the meat of the Trinity. Here in Hebrews, the author writes that the promises made by God, the long periods of waiting for those promises to be met, and then the hoped for and final "being made perfect" goal of creation are the hash browns of scripture theology. Likewise, the repairing and coordination of all things done by and done to us and creation, as quoted in Romans, those too are hash browns. 

The point of this analogy is for us to recognize that neither Hebrews or the book of Romans will really make any sense to us unless we already accept and indeed have securely ingested the meat and fat of the one God in three persons — Father, Son and Spirit. Without God in us, and prodding and prompting us, and popping up to us in all kinds of “coincidences” and miracles around us, then these two sets of verses just ramble on saying stuff that barely connects together.

“You just want hash browns? Why that’s only boiled potatoes shredded up, fried, and salted. That’s why they are called hash, for God’s sake. Let me make up a plate of God for you. I’ll give you some Sunny-side Jesus and Spirit Sausage. If you’re real hungry I’ve got the thickest Father bacon this side of the Rocky Mountains.”

Let’s assume, then, we’re all meated up and ready for our hash browns. It’s a theory of mine that we’re good enough with at least two of the persons of God, which is just like our breakfast choices. We can get by on just eggs, but eggs and bacon is better. In fact, eggs, bacon and sausage may probably be too much for us to take at any one meal. That’s an aside, but a kind of important one to me. Knowing one person of God is crucial recognizes the holy behavior of almost all religious people. Some religions are Spirit-based, others only see the Father-God. I believe only the Christians accept an incarnate divine Jesus. Based upon my theory, concentrating on two persons of God is radically life-changing, and probably the best most of us can ever attend to. Being open to all three persons, as one God, is truly other-worldly. It's a breakfast feast looked on with skepticism by everyone else in the restaurant. “Really, you’re going to eat all of that? And you’re having hash browns, too? Why don’t you throw in some rye toast and jam and totally embarrass yourself?” 

Enough of that.

So, what’s going on with this Hebrews comment? What is important in the hash brown statement that people lived their lives for God and then got martyred or shunned or insulted instead of seeing God’s promises fulfilled? Well, those people believed in God, knowing that God may not, and likely would not, save them from pain. Holy people expect the promise of a land of milk and honey, the promise of a king who rules over every nation, and the promise of evil being eradicated from our midst. They also know that God will probably not meet that litany of promises in their lifetime. God purposely holds off. 

The Jewish people understood the character of a waiting, patient God. And yet, they envisioned God differently than what Jesus revealed. The Jews waited upon God, they thought, just like God waited upon them. Many Jews did not accept Jesus as their Messiah when he finally did show up. Jesus didn’t look like the person that would fulfill these heady promises that they waited for, and that God waited to deliver. Jesus was not regal, nor authoritatively overpowering, and certainly not judgmental about the same things that had been adopted into Jewish culture.

Jesus was just a carpenter. His mother got pregnant before wedlock. His life involved gathering up cast-off folks, common folk, sinners, and bits and pieces of marginal Jewish people. He challenged cultural norms and questioned the meaning of religious ritual. Then, without the expected hubris, Jesus died an embarrassing death and rose in questionable circumstances, only to disappear after 40 days, and then reportedly leave behind a bunch of wild-eyed believers filled with and driven by the indwelling of Jesus with a consistently rude Holy Spirit, who seemed too willing to allow Jesus followers to be martyred.

This frustrating story of Jesus and his followers, and Jesus' presentation of himself, the Father, and the Holy Spirit is the question that Hebrews 11:39-40 answers. God waited for his incarnated Son to be born, and for the right time to send the Holy Spirit upon us, and then we now wait for Jesus return and the restoration and repair of everything. The catalyst for promises is in the waiting, ruminating, and hoping.

The waiting still continues, even today, and statistically maybe for another thousand years. Our source beliefs, the eggs, bacon and sausage form the center of where we begin. The promises that scripture foretold and still foretells hang in front of us like a hot cup of coffee that satisfies only temporarily. We get inklings and sips of what is to come. Even moments later we’re already waiting for our coffee to be refilled. It’s seemingly never-ending. Every morning, we start the whole breakfast routine all over again. 

That's the good news of the complimentary stuff. Everything gets explained in the extra details. “You want hash browns with that?” Of course we do.

Now we can maintain the steely-eyed focused purpose on God and his plan for us, especially amidst the tortuous unfair pain that strives to steal away our hope. Those last two verses in Hebrews.  “God had foreseen something better for us, so that without us they should not be made perfect.” God wants more people to be born before he calls quits on creation’s frantic cycle of life and death because everybody who’s being born is an integral part of the final plan of perfection. 

God sees the future, the perfected place for us, and it includes those who came before us, us, and those who are yet to come. He wants some fantastical version of us and everybody else in play and in place before he comes back and restores creation to its perfect state. Everyone must wait for the next group of folks coming up ahead. And, in the most incredible sense of it, everyone coming is worth waiting for. Worth waiting for in the most excruciating way. We will suffer and die, just like most have died before us. They waited for us. We wait for the rest.

We usually see the issue of delayed gratification as us waiting for God, but it’s the other way around. God and everyone who has gone before us was waiting for us. In the history of peoples, probably only 200,000 years of the multi-billion of the universe’s existence, God has watched every generation arrive knowing that the next generation gets closer to arriving at the very moment he’s waiting for.

God is waiting upon us, and when we will partner up with him, and when we will join our brothers and sisters. Waiting for what we each will go out and do for him. And then we wait for the progeny of our time to do the same thing. The churning of decades and populations excites God more than we can imagine, reminded for us in the delightful and complimentary taste of a side of hash browns.

“And we know,” says that verse in Romans, “that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.”

We imagine the angels mulling about as they chat with God over the latest batch of births. “As far as I can tell these folks are pretty much carbon copies of the last ones. It’s the same old, same old, all over again.”

But to God, we’re more and more lovely women and handsome gents collaborating with him to birth generation after generation. This next bunch of yahoos doesn’t seem all that big of a deal. Compared to the meat and eggs of a farmhouse platter, the hash brown don’t seem that big of a deal either. Nonetheless, they are complimentary to the meat. Add some rye toast and jam of hope, and I’m telling you, the waiting for those who follow us gives us even more reason to work together for good, according to the purpose of God.