A dear friend of mine is counting down the hours until her wedding. (She’s got sixteen hundred and something to go). The Jewish people are counting the forty-nine days between Passover and Shavuot. (Ten days down; thirty-nine to go). Christians are counting too, because after Resurrection Day comes Pentecost. Pentecost means “fiftieth” because it is the fiftieth day.
Suspenseful times, these, in ancient days, when you’d just celebrated the firstfruits of the barley, but the wheat crop was coming up, and you were holding your breath, hoping it wouldn’t rain and shatter the fragile heads of grain all over the ground.
This is precisely the time period meant by the new-risen Jesus (the “firstfruits of them that sleep”) when he told his disciples to wait in Jerusalem for the gift that was already on its way.
Suspenseful times, when your best-beloved, your Teacher, your friend, has flown away to heaven, and you’re waiting for a future which he assures you is better still.
Better than strolling through fields of wheat on a Sabbath day, talking and laughing with Messiah?
Wait and see.
What life has no waiting? The suspense, the holding your breath? And the joyfilled countdown.
See the anticipation in your Savior’s eyes. Don’t be afraid. Just wait and see!
PS These pictures? Have a silly story. Because I was all set to walk to a meeting, and rushed madly out the door. Ten minutes down the road, I realized I’d left an hour early. Oops. But my Shepherd knows me well, scatterbrain, shutter finger, and all — and the wait-and-see part of this story wasn’t long in coming. I slowed down, and walked right through this field of wild grain and wildflowers just when the light was absolutely perfect.
Elisabeth Adams 