“Still us in the waiting, O Lord —
Help us see how You’re working while we’re waiting,
How You’d come for all our wastelands,
How You’d heal
In all our hurtful hoping.”
What are we waiting for?
Sometimes it’s the wait that seems like a waste,
And the desperate longing that wears the hopeful down in their lingering,
Because these unknowns?, of diagnoses, deals, and dramas —
They can weigh us down in the carrying,
Work us up in all the worrying.
So what are we hoping for this Christmas?
What are we longing for beyond the craze of commercialized Christmas, and looking forward to, before the year turns its other corner?
And what hope can there be when things seem plateauing, and nothing turns out cooking?
Though Christmas comes the same every year with its mad dash to the mall, and our frenzied tinkering with toys and treats — we can celebrate Christmas differently this year.
We can anticipate Christmas the Advent way —
Of slowing down to be with Christ,
And savouring daily joy, growing in grateful giving,
Of loving our common living, and exercising a hopeful trusting —
This slow simmering of hope…, anticipating the coming Christ, our greatest Gift.
Because Christmas is really about being with Christ, about slowing down enough to matter what really matters. To count all the ways He’s come through for us, and all the love He has for us, even when we can’t see Him in the failure and fallenness of our world.
Because Advent means Arrival, but the Arrival did not come without the waiting —or the long agony of 4 centuries of silent waiting.
And so whatever we’re waiting and hoping for today,
We’re invited to wait along, so we can hope long — then rejoice all life long…
Because in every struggle to keep hope burning, and faith alive, and even our own struggling heart trusting,
we find our every answer when He suddenly came!
When He appeared as a babe in a manger, and all Bethlehem’s fields lit up like the noonday light, and the angels adorning the sky singing over some sleepy shepherds,
This coming King forever changing the topography of our human’s heart, forever shaping and sculpting our reason for hope.
So we can experience Christmas the Advent way; experiencing the Grace, the Gift, and the Goodness of God given to us.
Of knowing that all the waiting before wasn’t for nothing,
and that all our waiting today won’t be for nothing —
So that in all our wrestling and at times doubting over the goodness and greatness and gentle nearness of God, we can always be assured of His truthfulness, trustworthiness, and timeless love for us.
Because *Emmanuel* has come — “God with us”,
And He turns all our painful waiting into one passionate worshipping.
So that we can carve our own little sanctuary this Advent,
to simply experience our Gift —
A Grace forever renewing…
Hi Friends, our family is trying to do Christmas the Advent way here, of anticipating the Giver more than the gifts, and reading devotions that keep us forever sticking to the story of Christ through the Jesse tree, and the lighting of our Advent candles in the 4 Sundays leading up to Christmas,
And of me staying up late here trying to sketch a bit of words that document our learning,
May all the love and blessings be to you and yours! Love.
Pixel’s : Pic no 2,5,6,8