As I sit at my desk, I see piles of notebooks, paper and files that all silently ask, "When are you going to get to me?" I already know what it is I want to accomplish with it all, but most of it isn't finished yet. It all stretches out before me, creating its own time line by due date. So I'm living in a world of already-not yet. And I wonder, aren't we all? Already but not yet. Christmas decorations are already out but Christmas is over a month away as I write this. You get the idea. Already but not yet. Advent is that kind of season. We already know how the prophecies are fulfilled but we have to wait for the story to be told on the right day, at the right time. So already but not yet has waiting in it. Now there's a point, the difference between waiting and expectation. Expectation has a future in it. Waiting more often than not just sits and wags its feet, and like Mr. Micawber, believes vaguely that something will eventually turn up. Faced with a proposed action or outcome, it's easy in the "instant world" to go from concept to micromanagement in thirty seconds. Something proposed, however, is not something completed. So already but not yet takes time, it points to a process, an unfolding and a discovering of what shall be. We know what we want to have happen but it will take time, and as the task always expands to the time allotted to it, some tasks, hopes, and dreams can seem to take forever. In already-not yet, time's passage sometimes becomes painful, sometimes frustrating, but always carries the question "So what do I do until then ? Be expectant.

Advent gives us the prophecies of the birth of Jesus Christ, but the prophecies need to be fulfilled. Christmas celebrates His birth, but His ministry must begin. Epiphany celebrates His ministry among us, but the Cross is ahead.  Lent recalls for us the urgency of Jesus' last days of ministry and Holy Week slows our time to the daily walk with Jesus to the Cross. Easter celebrates the Resurrection and His presence with the disciples for forty days, but He has not yet ascended. The Ascension celebrates His rising to the Godhead to intercede for us, but the Holy Spirit still has to come to the church. Pentecost celebrates the gift of the Holy Spirit to the church, to those who believe and Trinity Sunday celebrates the fullness of our God Who creates, redeems and sanctifies.  then we tell the stories of Jesus' time with us week after week until we remember the Last Day and Final Judgement at the feast of Christ the King.  And then we begin the whole story again in Advent.

The whole story of faith seems to be an experience of already but not yet. If that's true then our place is to be expectant for God's next revelation, God's next action, God's next act of redemption and sanctification already working in us, but perhaps not seen.

Already, but not yet. Something to look forward to when saying our prayers.  Remember.