The Power of One Word

I attended the Wellspring service in Winter Park last night. For a few minutes, earlier in the evening, I'd thought not to go. I'd had a long day. Fatigue wrapped itself around me. Not so much tired. Fatigued.

But, I thought, this is the season of Advent. What better time to go than Advent?

The chapel of First United Methodist Church in Winter Park,
FL where the Wellspring services take place each
month. 

So I went. I drove along the brick streets of Winter Park, enjoying the Christmas lights as my radio played holiday tunes. I parked. I went inside the chapel at the First Methodist Church of WP. I spent time with Jan Richardson and her husband, Garrison Doles, helping them to light the candles. I conversed with my new friend, Steve, whose last name I don't know ... not because I never asked, but because it doesn't matter. I see Steve only once a month and--it is in knowing his first name and in the breaking of bread together that we are connected. The name of Christ holds us together as brother and sister. And, I find that amazing. Amazing enough to not ask his last name.

I know so few of the people who gather at Wellspring by name. Yet, we are brothers and sisters by The Name above all names. Additional amazement.

Our responsive reading came from Isaiah 60. Left side goes first. Right side follows. The right side always seems to me to be the loudest.

I sit on the left. Near the front. So I can see.

Jan instructed us to "reflect" on what we'd just read. As I did, I circled with my purple-inked pen the word "then" in ...

Then you shall see and be radiant; your heart shall thrill and rejoice. 

THEN. 

I jotted these notes in the margin:

One day.
Then.
Not today, perhaps, for night's shadows have fallen already.
Then.
Only then.
Maybe tomorrow.

During this season when heaven and earth meet in thin places, as Jan so poetically puts it, what are you waiting on? Or, waiting for? What must take place before the then can occur?

And, as you wait, will you trust the One who came? Will you wait for His perfect timing? His perfect "then"?