The 31st word in my Lent lexicon is:
WAIT.
At the very end of today’s gospel St John writes:
“They would have arrested him then, but because his time had not yet come no one laid a hand on him.”
His words touch on the sense of control and calm that Jesus seems to develop as we get closer to Holy Week and the passion. It’s something that is especially striking in John’s Gospel.
Although the crowd are angry and want to arrest him there is something in Jesus’ demeanour that stops them. It’s not the first time in Scripture that we’ve been told that Jesus slipped away because it wasn’t his time.
It marks a significant difference between his attitude and that of the crowd around him. All of them can feel the tension rising as Jesus travels round the country preaching and teaching. The crowd, acting in a perfectly understandable way, want to push things to a head, to take action, to force the situation.
Jesus, while he is equally aware of the tension, and possibly more aware of where it will lead, also knows that there is a right time for things to develop and move forward. So he is able to wait in the tension, knowing that his time will come.
Waiting is one of the hardest things to do even when life is straightforward and easy. It quickly becomes almost impossible as soon as life gets tough, painful, tense or stressful. In those situations any action seems preferable, because it’s less uncomfortable than waiting. Lent calls us to the uncomfortable practice of waiting.
Where is Christ asking you to learn to wait this Lent?