Action in Waiting

I like sitting around waiting for a plane or train. A short pause before a journey, the waiting can be very re-creative.

Rather symbolic of putting behind the past and forging ahead to a new day. All shapes and sizes of people - scurrying, waltzing, fiercely quarrelling - pass by, coming from somewhere far away and going off another place.

And I must wait.

So many thoughts, feelings, inner movements previously suppressed comes to surface while the suffocated noise of the day subsides in the quietude of waiting.

I guess that's how the rich journals of Wesley and the writings of Hudson Taylor were made. On the click-clocks of horseback-riding and the vast ebb and flow of the Pacific Ocean.

What a difference an hour can make.

Such moments are difficult to come by. Hard to create when we live in such tight routines defined by effectiveness, results and ISO standards. How fast can I perform a tonsillectomy? How much medical writing can I do in the 2 hours after my clinic and before my evening exercise? How many patients can I see in the 3 hour clinic I run? How much text can I cover in my 3 hour study time at night? Etc. Etc. It is simply impossible to find that 'door' that is the path of return to the heart and to God.

Moments like these are like the title of Christopher Blumhardt's book - Action in Waiting