A People Who Wait: I sat beneath the vine this morning and cried out from the depths of my heart to the Lord. We are used to waiting, but in these times, I felt more than ever as though our people have grown weary of waiting. How long Lord? How long will you turn aside from our cries? We are an occupied country, a despondent people, and we struggle to keep faith while pagans rule our lives. The teachers tell us to keep faith, obey the law, and then they add ever more restrictions to us, while neglecting the plight of our widows and orphans. Who will care for the fatherless? We do not have the children we need nor the land to produce. What of the stars in the sky Lord – the descendants you promised to Abraham, as many as the grains of sand on the shore? My neighbors waited so many years to have a child and now they have just one little girl. What can she do for her aged parents? What can she do for her people?
A Child at Dusk
I went on to work with my brothers and forgot my prayers. It was late and the sun was setting before we returned, and I called out to my wife as I came back home. But before I went in, I was drawn to look into the little garden beside my neighbor’s house. I could see a figure in the shade, sitting very still. It was Anna’s little girl, consolation of her parents’ old age, her face hidden by the curtain of dark hair. There was a silence around her, with no breath of wind and not even the sound of a bird singing.
I Am Coming
And then, words flew into the darkness and silence into my aching heart, words from among those I had memorized as a boy, words of hope:
‘Sing, rejoice, daughter of Zion, for I am coming to dwell in the middle of you – it is the Lord who speaks.’
I could just hear the girl was gently singing as she lifted up her face ‘The Almighty works marvels …’ I do not know how long I stood there watching her, but the moon must have risen because I saw a light on her face and her face was open and smiling. I had never known such a child as that one and I knew in that instant that no man, woman, or child in the land could love the Lord our God as she did. ‘What will you do for us Maryam?’ I thought. ‘Are you a Deborah, a Sarah, a Hannah or an Esther?’
I thought of my people, my people who walked in darkness, and the tears flowed over my beard. I whispered as though it were a prayer:
‘Oh good, gentle, brave little girl, you love the Lord so much – be a help to us!’
And the words of Zephaniah returned to my heart;
‘Sing, rejoice, daughter of Zion, for I am coming to dwell in the middle of you – it is the Lord who speaks.’
And the promise echoed within me.
‘Not long, not long … ‘I am coming!’
And my breast heaved with sobs as the words continued …
‘To dwell in the midst of you.’
