[1] Expectations change lives. One day a highschool teacher spoke to me about going to university. He wanted me to go to university and feared I might not. "You mustn't think that university is like highschool only worse", he told me forcefully. "University isn't `highschool only worse'; it's entirely different; it's a way of life." Expecting university to be better than highschool I went off to university.

My expectations concerning university put me on a road; the road led me into a new land. And what a land it was! I was admitted to the world of philosophy, a brand-new world for me, a world whose riches were -- and are -- inexhaustible. Philosophy taught me to think rigorously and think comprehensively. This is no surprise; after all, both logic and metaphysics are found in the philosophy-curriculum. I studied economics throughout my undergraduate program, and now know when politicians are talking economic sense and when they are spewing economic smokescreens. I expected something good from university, and found everything that I expected plus so much more.

When I married I expected married life to be better than single life. (Surely no one marries expecting married life to be worse.) Getting married put me on a road that took me into a new country. I have been married now for 27 years (almost) and still I find myself overwhelmed to realize afresh that I am the only person in the whole world who is married to Maureen. The thrill of it steals over me relentlessly.

[2] I should never want to suggest, however, that expectations always change lives for the better; often they change lives for the worse.

Think of the United Empire Loyalists who travelled from the New England states at the time of the American Revolution to the Saint John area of New Brunswick. Having suffered already on account of their loyalty to the crown, having endured the psychological shock of leaving behind farmland into which they had poured their sweat as they cut trees and unearthed stumps, having endured the hardships of traversing land and sea, they arrived in the Saint John area expecting to farm again as they had in New England -- only to find rock on all sides; and since rock drains poorly, wherever rock wasn't visible swamps were. Many of the United Empire Loyalists, I am told, were so broken by unfulfilled expectations that they lay down on the ground and decided not to get up -- ever.

Perhaps the single most common area of life where people assume they are setting out on a road opening onto glorious vistas only to find that it doesn't is marriage. It isn't so much that marriage quickly becomes a horror and a nightmare (although some marriages do) as that it never becomes anything. For many people marriage is never more than the biggest non-event they will ever know. Everything else in their lives -- work, sport, recreation, even over-the-fence chitchat -- any one of these is more interesting than an evening at home where two people don't "meet", don't do anything for each other, and know they never will.

[3] Some expectations, we should be careful to note, are not merely disappointing; they are destructive -- deadly, in fact. Some expectations are so very unrealistic that as long as we hold on to them they corrode relationships and acidify hearts.

Think of the unrealistic expectations that are often forced upon children. The child with above-average intellectual ability is expected to be a super-scholar. If the child had only average ability (or below-average ability), parents would not expect scholastic fame to be forthcoming. As it is, they expect what the child will never be able to deliver. Meanwhile, their relationship with the child corrodes as the child withers.

In the same way parents would never expect a son with average athletic ability to play in the NHL. But if the son has above-average ability they are just excited enough to hound him, telling him that with a little more effort he will make it -- forgetting, of course, that only one youngster among every 100,000 who play hockey at some level ever makes it to the NHL.

Unrealistic parental expectation is nothing less than a cruelty visited upon children.

Unrealistic expectations are deadly when someone who is emotionally wounded or socially inept expects his or her spouse to provide ready-to-hand psychotherapy or ready-to-hand social lubricants or ready-to-hand scapegoats or ready-to-hand disguises. If a spouse is expected to provide missing skills for someone's "schmoozing"; if a spouse is expected to provide the equivalent of psycho-surgery; if a spouse is expected to turn a social self-annihilator into a clone of Pierre Trudeau-charm, then expectations are not only unrealistic but even lethal.

While we are talking about unrealistic expectations that are also lethal we should keep in view the unrealistic expectations we have of ourselves. I speak now of perfectionism, perfectionism in any form at all: the religious perfectionism that thinks it can be sinless (or worse, that thinks it is sinless), the psychological perfectionism that wants to get beyond all vulnerability, the physical perfectionism that leaves the middleaged woman distressed because her body can't be made to look like the 17-year old's in a bathing suit. There is also the perfectionism that leaves the committee-member bitter because chairperson after chairperson is less than flawless, even as perfectionistic chair-persons acquire ulcers over committee-members who are "always useless." Perfectionism in any form is one more kind of unrealistic expectation whose unreality is poisonous.

[4] In everyday conversations we hear the question asked, "What can we expect?" The crucial word is "can". What can we expect? We can expect, human beings are able to expect, anything at all. Instead of asking, "What can we expect?", we should be asking, "What should we expect?" To be sure, we can expect what is gloriously fulfilled and more; we can expect what is disappointingly unfulfilled and depressing; we can expect what is unrealistic and deadly. But what should we expect?

(i) We should expect the contradictions of life to remain just that: contradictions as ununderstandable as contradictions always are. We should expect the unfairnesses of life to remain just that: unfairnesses as arbitrary as they are irksome.

When I was in fourth year philosophy one of my philosophy professors (later my friend), Emil Fackenheim, used to speak often of life's contradictions. I didn't grasp then what he was talking about. Years later, as I stood aghast before Fackenheim's own life, I understood what he meant by the contradictions of life. Born in the land of world-class medicine and music, philosophy and theology, literature and science, he found himself a young adult in swamp of vulgarity and oafishness. (Dietrich Bonhoeffer always maintained that before Nazism manifested itself as cruel it manifested itself as vulgar. It was so very vulgar that no one regarded it as serious enough to be evil.) Fackenheim himself, at one time imprisoned in a forced-labour camp, was deported to Scotland (and thence to Canada); his parents were on the last airplane to leave Berlin; his brother, on the other hand, couldn't get out of Germany and committed suicide there in 1941. Then Emil, an outspoken foe of assimilation, turned around and married a Gentile woman of Hungarian extraction! As a result, a great deal of Jewry has dismissed him as having nothing to say. One of his four children was born brain-damaged and was soon discovered to be violent. On a family-outing one day, the fellow trashed a restaurant and had to be institutionalized thereafter. When I heard Emil last (November, 1995), his mind was as sharp as ever. His wife, on the other hand, 18 years younger than he, is now confined to a nursing home on account of Alzheimer's.

Contradictions? Life abounds in contradictions! Those who expect not to find them in life are living in a world of make-believe. Then if we are realistic at all we should expect the contradictions of life and the unfairnesses of life to remain just that.

(ii) We should also expect international unrest to continue. "Wars and rumours of wars" is the expression our Lord uses, and he insists that wars and rumours of wars will be with us until the End.

We should expect evil to be both dramatic and subtle; both starkly black and deceptively bright; both macrocosmic and microcosmic; both brutish and seductive.

[5] "But isn't there a specifically Christian expectation that is also entirely realistic?", someone now gasping for hope wants to ask? Yes there is! There is a specifically Christian expectation that is entirely realistic; super-realistic, in fact, and therefore guaranteed -- the kingdom of God.

(i) We should expect the kingdom of God. Because our Lord has been raised from the dead, because his foes have been defeated -- all of them, whether earthly or cosmic -- because his foes have been defeated they are destined to be destroyed. The kingdom of God is guaranteed.

What's more, because the kingdom of God is guaranteed, we should not only expect it at some point in the future; we should expect signs of it now. We should expect to see manifestations of it, anticipations of it, now.

When Maureen and I were last in New York City we decided to visit a Mediaeval Museum at 190th street, the north end of the city. We could have travelled there quickly by subway, but took the bus instead since the bus would let us see more of the city. The bus-route wound through Harlem and Maureen had never seen Harlem. Soon we were the only white people on the bus. Shortly three black women boarded the bus and sat in front of us. Then a poor, elderly, shaky white woman attempted to get on the bus. The driver (black) asked her, "Do you know where you are going?" He wanted to be sure that this frail, elderly white woman knew what she was about before his bus took her any farther into Harlem. She told him she was going to Columbia Presbyterian Hospital, on the northern boundary of Harlem, in order to have eye-surgery. Whereupon she hooked her cane behind her neck, grasped the handrails with both hands, pulled herself up into the bus, and sat facing the three black women. These latter women chatted with her in genuine warmth and told her they would let her know (since her vision was so very poor) when the bus was at the hospital. In fifteen minutes we were in front of the hospital. The driver stopped; one of the three black women escorted the elderly white woman to the front door, entered the hospital with her and saw to it that she was straightened away -- when all the while the driver waited for the black woman to make her way out of the hospital and get back onto the bus.

In the kingdom of God, says Paul, there is neither Jew nor Gentile, slave nor free, cultured nor barbarian, black nor white. All of the "isms" that constitute walls higher than Everest -- sexism, racism, nationalism, ethnicism -- all of these walls that not only separate people but leave us slaying each other as well have been crumbled in Christ.

Since the kingdom of God is guaranteed, and since the kingdom has dawned in the incarnation of the king, anyone whom Christ has made to see is going to see signs of that kingdom-on-the-way.

My grandmother lived all her adult life in Windsor, Ontario. Frequently she shopped in Detroit. On one of her shopping forays into downtown Detroit she had a heart-spell and fell unconscious, albeit only for a few minutes. While she was sitting on the curb waiting for her head to clear and her strength to return a Detroit police officer approached her. He wanted to take her to a hospital. She insisted she wasn't going, since every Canadian knew what hospitalization cost in America. Why, one day in hospital, attention from one physician, submission to one procedure and she'd be in debt the rest of her life! Whereupon the police officer -- in Detroit! -- took her to a restaurant, ordered her a cup of coffee, paid for it, and sat with her until she was better and able to get back to Windsor.

A year or two ago Rabbi Larry Englander's father died. I went to the funeral. It was to be held in the Bathurst and Wilson area of Toronto, an area with a concentration of Jewish people. Arriving much too early for the funeral, I went to a restaurant -- "Markowitz's" -- for a cup of tea. As soon as I stepped inside the door I saw that I was the only Gentile in the building, all the men eating with their hat on. I saw too that every last seat was taken. I don't know what expression my face wore at that moment: bewilderment? confusion? strangeness? uncertainty? While I stood for a few seconds at the front of the restaurant a 75-year old Jewish man looked up at me, moved over on the bench he was occupying, and said in a manner that was knowing, profound, searching, affirming, inviting, all at once; he said, "There's room for us both." In that instant I apprehended everything he had in mind when he said, "There's room for us both", all the nuances he wanted to convey. I sat down with him. He told me he was a retired house-painter from Poland, the sole survivor of his family, a widower; he went to Markowitz's every noontime for his main meal of the day. I told him I was a clergyman. "Oh, I already knew that!", he said warmly, "I could just tell."

In his letter to the congregation in Ephesus Paul insists that of all the dividing walls of hostility the highest is between Jew and Gentile; and even this wall Jesus Christ has reduced to dust. My encounter in Markowitz's was an anticipation of that day when not even the dust will remain.

Does all of this mean that painful developments, distressing developments, are necessarily not anticipations of the kingdom? Quite the contrary. There are some developments that are certain anticipations of the kingdom just because they are painful and distressing. When the Gestapo arrested Pastor Martin Niemoeller and took him to jail in Berlin, one of the first persons he met there was the prison chaplain. They recognized each other instantly, as both had been naval officers in World War One. The prison chaplain, now a spineless Nazi stooge, looked at Niemoeller in amazement and blurted out, "Pastor Niemoeller, why are you in jail?" Niemoeller stared back at the cowardly prison chaplain and replied carefully, "Why are you not?" Niemoeller had to endure eight years of imprisonment. His wife suffered a nervous breakdown. He was scheduled for execution -- only to be liberated by the Americans with three days to spare. The fact of his imprisonment was a sign of that kingdom whose full manifestation is as sure as the sunrise.

There's more to be said. Since the kingdom of God entails not only evil defeated and dispelled but also sin deplored and overcome, we should look within ourselves as well for anticipations of the kingdom. Since we claim to be eager, loyal subjects of the king himself we must ask ourselves, "What victory, however slight, and likely known only to us -- what victory nonetheless have we discerned in ourselves and regularly praise God for in view of our besetting sins and temptations both habitual and unforeseen? What God-wrought triumph brings a glow to us every time we think of it?" Such a present victory we should expect, knowing that this expectation is entirely realistic for Christ's people.

[6] Last to be mentioned but not last in importance: we can expect our unseen Friend to be Friend still, to be an ever more intimate friend, and to render us ever-better friend to him. On the eve of his death Jesus said to the disciples, "No longer do I call you servants...but friends." In the Hebrew bible two persons are especially addressed as "friend of God": Abraham and Moses. Abraham is our foreparent in whose family we know and enjoy that intimacy with God that Abraham himself cherished. Moses, on the other hand, bequeathed to us the pattern of that obedience that all true friends of God are eager to render to him. Did not Jesus say, "You are my friends if you do what I command you"? When our Lord insisted that disciples are not finally servants (however much we serve him) but finally friends, he had all of this in mind.

He also had something more in mind. In the ancient world beyond the borders of Israel the emperor or king spoke of a few, hand-picked people as his friends. They were known officially as "friends of the emperor" or "friends of the king". Those named "friend" had privileged access to the ruler. They could appear before him day or night. They could be sure of instant access and a ready hearing. The ruler, for his part, regularly conferred with his "friends" first thing in the morning, so early, in fact, that his friends were admitted to his bedroom. The ruler conferred with his "friends" before he met economic advisers, political counsellors, military leaders, or financiers.

When Jesus names us friends he means that we have untrammelled access to him at any time for any reason, for we are "friends of the ruler". He also means that like Abraham of old we are granted not only access but intimacy; and like Moses of old our gratitude for our intimacy moves us to obedience. He will always welcome as "friend", even as he renders us better friend to him. This we should expect today -- and expect every day.