Waiting… (May/Pentecost)

James Cathcart May 03, 2026 0

3 May - 6 June

Open the Resource Pack PDF for all the information on the weekly subthemes and the daily prompts and Bible readings which shape our Daily Worship and live streams.

Read our simple format Pentecost Bible Study for 2026 PDF (full colour booklet coming soon).

In the beginning…

In the beginning… creation waited.

There was nothing else for it.… Reality, it turns out, takes time to load…

Then this lump of rock suspended in the universe received life and colour through the voice of God.

And then, after more waiting, humanity — a family to share it.

This pattern of waiting, receiving and sharing repeats itself throughout the Bible and throughout history. Through prophecy and poetry, pictures and patience, prayer and protest God’s people wait on God, receive from God, and then share with God.

This waiting has sometimes been dull, exasperating, dispiriting, galling, and frightening. But it has also been peaceful, blessed, exciting, humbling, stretching, and enriching. Waiting it turns out, is not optional, it is part of the rhythm of life. Receiving and sharing come through waiting — like a tree comes through seed and rain and sunlight. There is no such thing as an instant tree — a tree is a storied thing with a story to tell in each of its rings. Some of the most beautiful things have very long wait times.

Waiting is deep in our psyche. From infancy — we have to wait on other people for everything. So we scream and cry out. There’s nothing else for it. We come into a loud and vibrant and confusing world full of things we don’t understand, but already we’re full of deep longing and needs. And this experience continues into childhood — where a day can feel like an eternity — and into adulthood. We never stop making our way in a loud, vibrant confusing world full of things we don’t understand and we don’t never stop having deep longings and needs to fulfil. That is the human experience. To know what is and to know what could be. To hope.

But in all our waiting, all our longing, all our hoping — God waits with us. The Holy Spirit is closer to us than we’ll ever know, in our heart laughing and sighing and crying out with us.

For God is waiting too.

In Week one — Loading… we think about some ‘load screens’ in the Bible, starting with very first one as Reality 1.0 is installed.
In Week two — Typing… we explore the sometimes agonising wait for an answer, a response, a confirmation.
In Week three — Downloading… we continue the digital metaphors thinking about the updates that the prophets and psalmists urge us to look out for — are we ready for the new thing God is doing?
In Week four — Expecting… as we come to Pentecost we move from the digital metaphors of loading, typing and downloading to the physical, flesh, blood, and fire metaphors of birth and flame!
In Week five — Anticipating… as the theme draws to a close we ask one another, what are we anticipating? For ourselves, our communities, our churches, our world? What do we long to receive, what do we long to share?

Each week of this theme runs Sunday-Saturday and has its own subtheme, which contains daily Bible readings and prompts for thought (see the Resource Pack PDF for more information).

Check out simple format PDF of our Bible Study.