Expectancy

As Advent is unfolding, my prayer for all of us is that this season of expectancy can fully warm our hearts. There seems to be so much that is drawing us downward from national tumult to perpetual violence to stubborn divisions. The headlines remain the same regardless of the day, week, or month. We need good news of great joy for all people.

Which immediately brings into focus a gift the community of faith has to offer anyone and everyone as we walk toward Bethlehem—we have the gift of hope. We have the promise that the child born to Mary came to reconcile all people on earth. We have the promise embodied in that child that heaven and earth are brought together in a communion that nothing can taint or diminish. We have the glory of God with us to offer to a world shrouded in the continual darkness of human depravity. We have the good news of great joy.

But the community of faith needs to hear and believe the good news first before we can share it with others.

Advent is a season of preparation. It is meant to slow us down and call us into a quiet state of seeing. We are to listen deeply to the message of the carols. We are ponder deeply in our hearts, following Mary, the messages of angels we hear in familiar scriptures. We are to simply sit and bask in the soft embrace of candles and greenery as our sanctuaries are transformed. We are to watch and wonder as Mary and Joseph begin their long walk home. Do we see the Immanuel sign Isaiah foretold? Do we see the star from Jacob rising that Balaam saw so many centuries ago? Do we accept these promises as for us and about us?

As we feel these things burrow within us, share them. We will not need to look far or wide to find someone also in need of the comfort and peace of the Christ child. We all need hope. We all need love. We all need a reason to sing for joy. Share these things.

Then prepare for wonder.

Christmas is coming, and as the Grinch found out a while back, it comes without packages or bows, it comes quietly and subtly. It comes in a sudden moment when we feel connected in ways we have not felt for a while. It comes when we suddenly hear a carol in the air as we trek across a parking lot. It comes when a card arrives from someone from whom we had not heard in a long, long time. It comes, faithfully and earnestly, invading our world as it is so we can become who we are to be as children of God.

Keep the faith. Hold the promises. All can be well.