When we adopted our children from Russia, the process required two trips. The first was to meet them, to hold them, to smile at them, to begin the long, uncertain journey of becoming a family. After that first visit, we wouldn’t be able to return for nearly a year to finalize everything and bring them home. It was a season marked by waiting, hoping, and praying. Nothing was guaranteed.
Before we left the orphanage, we gave our children pictures, just simple photographs of us, smiling and together. To us, they were small gestures. But to them, they were everything.
Both of our children had been abandoned. That picture was the only glimpse of a family they had. The only hint of the love they longed for. The only thread of hope that someone, anyone, was coming for them. It was more than an image. It was a lifeline. A promise. A whisper of security from the life they were trapped in.
We later found out that our daughter, who was a bit older, kept that picture with her the entire year she was waiting. She didn’t speak much English then, but later she told us she looked at it often. It reminded her that her parents were real, and they were coming back.
After we were finally home, she spotted that same picture in our house. Her eyes lit up, and in her broken English, she asked, “Can I keep this…on my…dresser?”
Of course, we said yes. She set it where she could see it every night as she drifted off to sleep; a constant reminder of the parents who had come for her once and would never leave again. She wanted that picture close, because it held her hope. During that yearlong wait, she had never let go of the belief that we were returning for her.
Aren’t we the same way with Christ?
Aren’t we all waiting for a love we don’t fully have yet? A love that can only be quenched by the One who created us? Aren’t we longing for a home we’ve never seen, but somehow already miss? A life we’ve only dreamed of, the one He’s preparing for us?
Can you imagine that reunion?
The day we see Him face to face, the One we’ve trusted, the One we’ve loved from afar, the One who promised He was coming back.
What a party it’s going to be. What joy. What laughter. What healing. I cannot wait to see Him when He finally comes for me, because I’m waiting.
It reminds me of Simeon and Anna in Luke Chapter 2. Here's how I imagine it.
The Wait Was Over
Simeon’s steps were slower these days, each one measured, his back slightly bent with age. But his hope, oh, his hope was still upright and strong. For years he had risen in the early light, walked the familiar streets to the temple, and lifted the same prayer: Lord, let me see Your Messiah before I die.
It was a promise whispered to him by the Holy Spirit, and Simeon had believed it. Day after day, month after month, year after year, he had scanned the temple courts, watching the faces of strangers, wondering if today might be the day.
Then one morning, as golden light poured over Jerusalem’s rooftops, the Spirit’s voice came again: Go. He obeyed. His heart pounded like a young man’s as he stepped into the temple courtyard. And there, just beyond the entrance, he saw them.
A young couple stood cradling a tiny child. They looked ordinary, almost unremarkable to the crowd bustling around them. But to Simeon’s eyes, they were radiant. The breath caught in his throat. Without asking, he knew.
The Promise. The Hope of Israel. Salvation itself swaddled in soft cloth.
His old hands trembled as he reached for the baby. Mary looked at Joseph; Joseph nodded. And then, after all those years, Simeon’s arms closed around the Christ. The child was warm and impossibly small. His tiny heartbeat pulsed against Simeon’s chest, but the weight in Simeon’s arms was far greater than any child, he was holding the hope of the world.
In that moment, Simeon needed nothing more from life. The world could fade away and he would not miss it. He had seen salvation with his own eyes, touched it with his own hands. Peace with God had settled into his bones, and even death no longer cast a shadow.
“Lord,” he whispered, tears blurring his vision, “now You can let Your servant depart in peace, for my eyes have seen Your salvation.”
Joseph and Mary stood still, wonder etched into their faces. They marveled at the words this gray-haired stranger spoke over their newborn son.
From a distance, another figure had been watching. Anna, her back slightly stooped, her silver hair catching the golden light. She was a familiar sight in the temple courts. She was a prophetess, known by name to the priests, the merchants, and the families who came to worship. Widowed as a young woman, she had chosen not to remarry. Instead, she gave her days and nights to God. For decades, she lingered here among the colonnades and stone steps, her sandals wearing grooves into the same worn paths.
The temple had become her dwelling place, and prayer her native language. Some mornings she could be found whispering psalms before the altar; other days she stood with arms raised toward heaven, fasting for the redemption of her people. She carried an unshakable expectancy that the Messiah would come, and she was determined to be here when He did.
The moment her eyes fell on the child in Mary’s arms, her spirit leapt. She didn’t need an introduction. She knew. Tears welled and traced the lines of a face carved by both age and devotion. The years of waiting, the countless petitions, the lonely nights of intercession, all of it found its answer in this moment. Praise rushed from her lips, uncontained and unstoppable.
Then she turned to those around her, worshipers, merchants, parents with children tugging at their robes, and her voice rang out with unexpected strength: “He’s here! The One we’ve been waiting for is here!” It was the joy of recognition. The deep, certain knowing when the promise you’ve carried in your heart finally stands before you.
Neither Simeon nor Anna would walk this earth much longer. Their years had been many, and their crowns of gray were beautiful in God’s sight. But they had lived to see the Promise kept. The wait was over.
The Messiah had come.
The Picture and the Promise
Sometimes I think about my daughter in that orphanage; how she must have studied that picture of us over and over, her small fingers tracing the outlines of our faces. Maybe she whispered our names, trying to remember how our voices sounded. Maybe she pressed the photo to her chest when the nights felt too long.
She didn’t know the date we’d return. No calendar had a circle on it. She only had our picture and the memory of being chosen. But that was enough.
The picture reminded her she belonged to someone now. It reminded her that love had found her and promised to come back. The promise became her anchor.
Isn’t God’s Word like that for us?
It’s the picture He left behind, not on glossy paper, but in the pages of Scripture. A living portrait of who He is: His goodness, His tenderness, His truth. It tells the sweeping story of creation and redemption, of a Savior who came once, and who’s coming again.
Over and over again, He tells us: I will return.
I will gather you.
I will take you to the home I’ve prepared.
You are Mine.
“Truly, truly,” He says, “I will come again and take you to be with Me, that where I am, you may be also.” (John 14:3)
But the waiting stretches long sometimes. Life moves fast, and eternity feels far. The longer the delay, the more the world tries to dull our memory. The picture fades at the edges. The enemy whispers, Did He really say He’d come back?
In those moments, I remember Simeon.
I picture his weathered face, eyes scanning the temple courtyard like he’d done a thousand times before. He didn’t demand a sign in the sky. He didn’t ask for proof. He simply kept showing up. Day after day. Year after year. Listening to the whisper of the Spirit. Trusting the God who had made a promise.
I remember Anna.
I see her slipping quietly into the temple before dawn, lifting her wrinkled hands in prayer. She had outlived most of her generation. She had lost her husband after just seven years of marriage, but she didn’t grow bitter. She didn’t let grief harden her heart.
Instead, she gave herself to worship. She fasted, she prayed, she served, she stayed. She filled her waiting with purpose. She taught others to hope. The temple was her dwelling place, and her joy remained rooted in the God who saw her, sustained her, and promised redemption.
They were old. Their bodies frail. But their faith? Stronger than ever.
And then, He came.
In that sacred moment, all the waiting, all the prayers, all the lonely years were fulfilled in a single glimpse of the Messiah.
That’s what we’re doing too, isn’t it? While we wait?
We hold onto the picture.
We trust the promise.
We live in expectation.
It doesn’t mean the waiting is easy. It isn’t. Some days, it feels like He’s been gone too long. Like maybe He changed His mind. But He hasn’t. We serve a God who cannot lie. If He said He’s coming, He’s coming.
So we keep returning to the temple, whatever that looks like in our daily lives.
We keep worshiping.
We keep praying.
We keep teaching others to hope.
We keep our faces turned toward heaven.
Because one day, we will see Him. Face to face.
The wait will be over.
And we’ll know it was worth it. Every single day.
So hold on to the picture.
Keep it close.
He’s coming.
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