I notice in the Old Testament stories of Tobit and Abraham we’ve been reading lately that there’s always a “meanwhile” going on. Tobit is struck with blindness, leaving him fumbling in the dark. “Meanwhile” his son Tobiah is being blessed with a new bride and the money needed back home, besides a cure for his father’s blindness.

 Abraham sends out emissaries to arrange for a burial place for his wife Sarah and to get a wife for his son Isaac. “Meanwhile” he has to wait, not knowing how it will turn out or when. It’s out of his control.

“Meanwhile” God at work and that work, far beyond what we immediately see, bless us too.

Maybe we should think of “meanwhile” more? We belong to the Me generation, easily stuck on ourselves and what’s happening to us so that we fail to see beyond. We can even limit God to One concerned for us, but God is greater than that. Something bigger than ourselves is taking place and we will share in its good. 

“Meanwhile” is God’s time. 

In Rembrandt’s drawing above, Tobit is hitting up against a brick wall. He’s blind in more ways than one. He can’t see anything else.