Friday Five: Wait and Pray

Sally at Rev Gals offers this Friday Five, which is timely for me (this has been happening a lot lately with the Friday Five: one on signs of hope, another on moving, this one on waiting...)

Part of the Ascension Day Scripture from Acts 11 contains this promise from Jesus;

"But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”

Then he was taken from their sight into the clouds, two angels appeared and instructed the probably bewildered disciples to go back to Jerusalem, where they began to wait and to pray for the gift Jesus had promised.

Prayer is a joy to some of us, and a chore to others, waiting likewise can be filled with anticipation or anxiety....

So how do you wait and pray?

1. How do you pray best, alone or with others?

Honestly, with others. I'm suffering from a combination of laziness and frustration in my prayer life lately, and so I find that mostly I pray during worship or in moments with other people. It's good discipline for me. It would be very easy to give up praying if I only prayed on my own, which is one of the reasons worship is so important to me.

2. Do you enjoy the discipline of waiting, is it a time of anticipation or anxiety?

I like waiting for things if I know they are going to happen: waiting for Christmas, or for Beloved to visit this weekend, or for a family celebration. I don't like waiting when it's completely open-ended and unsure as to how long I will need to wait, or whether the thing I'm waiting for will ever happen. Lots of anxiety around those things for me.

3. Is there a time when you have waited upon God for a specific promise?

Ah. Yes. Still waiting. (I suppose there's no direct promise to me that we will have a child. But God does seem to be fond of babies who show up after a long time of waiting, so I'm counting on that.)

4. Do you prefer stillness or action?

Depends. I'm better at action. I could use some lessons about stillness, except that I don't generally enjoy them when they come.

5. If ( and this is slightly tongue in cheek) you were promised one gift spiritual or otherwise what would you choose to receive?

I really can't answer that. I would like to say "patience," except that I'm tired of being patient, so truthfully, I don't really want that gift. I'm not sure.