Expect the Unexpected

Delayed flights, late arrivals, unexpected guests, unpaid over-time, and change of plans….We like to have everything under control, and in perfect timing.

We like to know our work schedule, when dinner is ready, and that our favorite tv show comes on at the same time every night. We go to church, sit in a pew for an hour, maybe an hour and fifteen minutes, but once it gets past that, enough is enough. We like to know what is coming up ahead. We have our schedules programmed into our phones so we can know our next dentist appointment, next meeting, and our next family gathering.

It’s when these things change that we get caught off guard, because our culture prioritizes time. If something takes too long, we find another way to accomplish it. Visits with friends/family are good, but there is a fine line between visiting and staying too long. If our favorite tv show is delayed because of a football game, we feel restless waiting.

Basically we don’t know how to expect the unexpected, but life calls us to handle the unexpected whether we like it or not. We are guaranteed to run into unexpected moments- sometimes small things, other times big things?

Like job loss,

Death,

Declining health,

Foreclosure,

Divorce,

Broken relationships…

If we can’t handle a change as simple as a delayed tv show, how can we ever be able to handle these unexpected changes?

There is one verse that catches me off-guard in the gospels. You think you know Jesus. You see Him care for the blind, hurt, & sick. He will do just about anything to save and heal them but when His close friend gets sick and He is called for, what does Jesus do?

When He heard he [Lazarus] was sick, He [Jesus] stayed two more days in the place that He was.

That’s not what we want to hear, and definitely not what we expect from a man who is the healer, who welcomes the sick/lame, and who could heal people with just a word. He could have just said the word, and Lazarus would have been well. So why didn’t He?

Jesus was so close with Lazarus and his sisters that they were like family.  When we have close friends/family that have to endure the pain of going through health battles, we wish we could help in some way. We wish we could take away the pain and make everything all better. If Jesus cared, wouldn’t He want to do the same? Surely He would know that Lazarus’ sisters were overcome with grief. If He truly loved them like the Bible says He did, wouldn’t He drop everything to be at their side, not only to heal Lazarus, but to console them? That is what love is to us, but what we see Jesus do is the reverse of how we would expect Jesus to demonstrate His love.

To us, love doesn’t delay. Love doesn’t say- I’m busy I’ll get there when I can. It doesn’t leave us in the time of our greatest need.  When love can make a difference, it moves to make things better, right?

Once again we’re reminded that God’s ways of loving are not our ways. So does that mean when we are at our greatest hour of need, God won’t come in to save the day?

That is where we are left hanging.  We can all count the times we thought that God has let us down.

But what we don’t realize is that Jesus shows His love through the unexpected. The way He saves is through teaching us who we are and who He is.

Sometimes we are like Lazarus’ sisters who hope that Jesus comes to save us from our pain, but sometimes we need to be reminded that Jesus is bigger than our pain or any trial we go through.

Jesus won’t always come running when we call for Him because God doesn’t hurry, but that doesn’t mean He doesn’t hear. What He will do is show you who is bigger than your trial.  When we call on God for help we expect Him to be there because He loves us, but usually what we need most is to be saved from our expectations.

Lazarus’ sisters may have thought Jesus left them hanging when really Jesus’ plans would help them understand Him better. He loved them too much to simply say the words that would heal Lazarus.  Instead He showed them His power, glory and authority by raising him from the dead.

There is nothing wrong with calling out to God when we need Him. God wants us to do that, but when the unexpected hits us- job loss, death, bankruptcy, health issues, Jesus wants to remind us that salvation is not found in these things. They are found only through Him. ‘So don’t expect Jesus to save us by teaching us to depend on the things we are afraid of losing’ (Barnes). He loves us too much to let that happen.

Sometimes He waits. He waits so that we may learn that He alone is salvation.

When we are in that time period of waiting, we have a hard time understanding this. I’m sure Lazarus’ sisters didn’t understand. Waiting is hard. We don’t like it when our schedules or lives are flipped upside down, but maybe it’s during the waiting that we learn the important lesson that what we rely on here on earth isn’t what can save or satisfy.

When Jesus comes on the scene, in His perfect timing, He will save the day, in His own unexpected way. He defies the unexpected, and when He does, we may have a life-altering lesson. Other times it takes us time to comprehend what God has done for us.

Sometimes time is everything.

Advertisement