Advent: what are you waiting for?
What are you waiting for?
Much of life is spent waiting:
- Waiting in a check-out or check-in queue.
- Waiting for a delivery.
- Waiting for a response to a call, email or text.
- Waiting for a bus or train.
- Waiting for the car to be fixed.
- Waiting for someone to do what they promised.
- Waiting for someone to leave or someone to arrive.
- Waiting for justice.
- Waiting for pain to end, sickness to pass.
- Waiting for a war to be over.
- Waiting for an expected birth or death...
I won't.
What are you waiting for?
Waiting is a recurring theme in Advent, the four weeks of preparation before Christmas.
Advent waiting is a particular sort of waiting.
It may be silent or noisy, calm or exciting, but never passive. It isn't waiting for Christmas. It's more like looking forward and preparing for a guest. This guest has promised to come but doesn't say when.
This Guest is so much more than an ordinary guest.
This Guest comes in ordinary ways:
- just one among many newborn babies
- quietly in the heart
- in disguise as a person in need or through any person
- He comes through sights and sounds.
- He comes through words, prayers and pictures.
- He comes through music and sculpture.
- He comes through science and the natural world.
- He comes in many ways.
This Guest also comes in extraordinary ways:
- through miracles
- through love and forgiveness
- through reconciled enemies
- through transformed lives and communities
- and one Day will come in great power and glory.
To 'wait for the Lord' is to be:
- attentive and watchful
- alert and awake
- fully present in the present moment
- prepared and ready
- praying, working and living for God's reign of love, justice and peace to fully come.
I love this song from the Taizé community, 'Wait for the Lord'.
"Wait for the Lord,whose day is near.Wait for the Lord,keep watch, take heart."
Image Credit: Pixaby, public domain
Comments
Post a Comment