Waiting & Milestones

Over the weekend, our oldest son graduated from college. The weekend was wonderful and full of celebration, but we also spent a lot of time waiting. We had to arrive early for each event we attended to get seats. For two of those events, being 30 minutes early was enough. But for the day of graduation, we had to arrive two hours before graduation began.

As my younger son, husband, and I sat waiting for the ceremony, I was thinking about how much of our lives are spent waiting.

Sometimes the waiting feels painful, and other times it is full of anticipation.

There is waiting that happens before we are born, and waiting that happens once we arrive.

From our conception, someone is paying attention to particular milestones. Once we are born, there are new milestones to observe, like sleeping, eating, crawling, walking, talking, etc. We are completely unaware of these milestones for the first several years of life. Our lives are slow. We move at a pace that often becomes unfamiliar later in life.

As we get older and begin school, we find ourselves working toward the end of the year, or eventually toward graduation. There are markers along the way that demonstrate our growth and understanding, or lack thereof.

Once high school is over, we may attend university and spend more years waiting to graduate again. Or we might enter the workforce and begin waiting for retirement.

We often find ourselves waiting on medical reports, payday, vacation, family time, and the next opportunity that will challenge us.

We might find ourselves waiting to get married, start a family, start a business, or achieve the next milestone on the journey. 

And though it isn’t that fun to think about, all of our lives are moving toward death. Someday, we will take our last breath and no longer be present in this life. But, if we know Jesus, we also hold onto the promise of resurrection and the new heaven and new earth one day. The ultimate thing we are waiting to experience.

We’ve been preparing for graduation for months. Regalia had to be ordered, photos taken, announcements sent, paperwork completed to make it official, time off from work requested, schedules shifted, etc, etc. And now it is done.

As a family, we’ve been anticipating it. We have celebrated it. We have been present to all of the parts of it. And now we look ahead and wonder what will the next season hold.

There is something about completing a milestone that leaves us with a mixture of joy and sadness. There is joy because we have reached our goal, we’ve completed the task. And there is sadness because in completing that thing, whatever it might be, there is a grief as seasons change and morph into something new.

When we were little, waiting to reach a milestone didn’t faze us because we were just living life, not worried about accomplishing a particular objective by a specific date. Other people in our sphere were concerned about those things, but not us. We were oblivious.

I wonder if there is a way to regain some of that innocence. To trust the journey of growing up. To not be in a rush to get to the next milestone. To stay present and live today without rushing ahead to the next thing.

In the waiting is where we are formed to be more like Jesus. In the waiting is where our knowledge expands. In the waiting is where we grow up. In the waiting is where transformation happens. In the waiting is where we are wounded and where we find healing and surrender.

The waiting seems to be an essential part of the journey, yet we often want to rush on to the next thing, wanting to forgo the waiting and its discomfort.

I wonder, where do you find yourself waiting today? How do you see Jesus meeting you in that space? Are you able to linger there and trust that God is guiding you through milestones that make up a beautiful life? 

~  Melissa