In the 60^th. the poet Lawrence Ferlengetti captured some the mood of our lessons in a poem he titled  “I Am Waiting.”

            I does seem that we often spend much of our life waiting for something.. waiting for better times, waiting for the right person, waiting in line at the ACME, waiting for a diagnosis, waiting to graduate, waiting for our a promotion, waiting for the grandchildren to  come an visit and then waiting for them to home again.

            At MLC we are waiting to get word on a loan while we wait to start a building…

The words of Scripture are right on target…

In the midst of our waiting we read of others before us who also waited.

            The prophet Is. addressed his countrymen who where waiting to return home while exiled in Babylon, far from their beloved homeland..

Far from the familiar sights, sounds and smells of children laughing.. . calling out to mothers and fathers in their native Hebrew… Babylon was not home…

            Today we hear about others before us who where exiled – who where waiting for a better time and a better place.

            In the second lesson the Apostle Paul speaks of a self imposed exile.. an exile not so much geographically but more theologically.

            “For though  I am free with respect to all, I have made       myself a slave to all..”

Paul details the many ways in which he has identified with those who are “not like him” in order that he may “connect” with them for the purpose of  sharing the “Good News.”

            To the weak I became weak.

            To those without the law I became like them…          anomus without the law.

            I have become all things to all people that I might save       some – I do it all for the sake of the Gospel.

The point being, that Paul journeyed into a strange land to tell of the Good News of Jesus Christ.

            The land of the Jews – the people of the Law.

            The land of the Gentiles – the people without the       Law.

            The Legalist and Hedonists – The Conservatives       and the Progressives…

If you think that we live in a pluralistic time, the time of the Apostle  easily trumps us.

The point of Paul’s Epistle, which marks our second lesson for today.. is that for the sake of Jesus,

Paul was willing to leave behind the familiar,

the comfortable,

the “known”  in order that  he might connect with those who’s world was vastly different from his.      There had never been anything like “the Gospel” in Paul’s day and I venture to guess that the Good News is still as alien and new for many in our day, Christians and non- Christians alike.

“I have become all things for all people…”

            Now let’s fast forward to Mark’s story.

We learn that Simon Peter’s mother-in-law was sick in bed with a fever.

In only a few short vss. We move from a sick mother-in-law to town that moved the local emergency room onto the front door where Jesus was staying:

            “The Whole City Was Gathered Around the Door”. By early morning, under the cover of darkness, Jesus sneaks out and to a lonely place… it is not long until the disciples catch up with him and reprimand him for leaving all of those who still need healing in a lurch. “Everyone is looking for you!”

            Jesus pays them no mind… as they would say in Georgia..  It is time to move on, so that “I may proclaim the in the message in other places also… “because that is what I came out to do”v. 38.

The message of course is the same message as the one in Is.  and in Paul,

            “ Have you not heard? Have you not known? The     Lord is an everlasting God, the creator of the ends of             the earth .He does not faint or grow weary; his             understanding is un-searchable. He gives power to the faint, and strengthens the powerless. … those     who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they         shall run and not be weary, they shall  walk and not    faint.”

            What is implied that it is, in the waiting, in the Exile, in the disability, the loneliness of strange land,

 that God is most often present and  active.

            So we wait, whether that be in our personal pain or as a congregation that is in transit from Sea Isle to where ever on hwy. 9 in Claremont.

So you wait, if you are praying for a change in your family or personal life..  or for a new job or an old job that is boring; but it is not an empty waiting… it is a waiting with a promise.

            A waiting with possibilities – a waiting where strength is given, and the spirit lifts those who are waiting…. as if carried on the wings of an eagle … “they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.”

            A waiting with work to  do..

We are to live out the possibilities of the Gospel.

You may be bleeding but your are also being bled for. . . “the blood of Christ shed for you” we say and  believe!

            As a congregation you have struggled, you have made sacrifices to come this far… so, what ever the outcome of our loan application let us remember that these are times of great difficulty for many in our land and in the world…  so let our waiting not be a wasted empty waiting, let our waiting not be a waiting of complaining and blaming, be that as a congregation or as individuals.

Let it be a waiting with meaning, purpose and dignity and above all a “faith waiting.”

            Be usefull,

 Dr. Wilbur (played by Michael Cain) in the movie Cider House Rules, based on the novel by John Irving, said to Homer Wells, the orphan who eventually leaves to find his palace in the world… be useful.

            Each night Dr. Wilbur reads  to the boys, some forlorn, some attractive, some not so – all wanting desperately to be adopted which means to be loved and wanted by someone. Some will never be adopted. Some are awkward or physically impaired, some sick, and one who will die while waiting.

And every night after he reads to them, and covers them up and the lights go out he stands in the doorway and utters these   words:

“Good night, you Kings of New England,

Good night you princes of Main..”

            That is what we are really waiting for –  a sense that we matter, that there is meaning to our lives because someone wants us and loves us.  Someone to say

“Good Night your Princes of the world – Good night you kings of the kingdom.”

            And because of that, because we know ourselves loved and wanted, a way of being useful… we have a reason to get up and even in the waiting, find that we can be renewed, strengthened and healed…

amen.