The HOPE of Advent
The HOPE of Advent
Pastor’s Ponderings – December 2018
Will you wait on me? I’m pretty tired and it took all of Thanksgiving week to sleep through the night. I kept waking up and thinking about you and the world and my family and the thoughts run around my head dumping over my neat organized piles of hopes and making a mess of it all.
What were you hopeful for in January that you’ve given up on this year? Did the list of things you hoped for this year get disorganized with the messiness of living? Advent is that season of remembering your hope. Advent is the time we remember waiting for God’s love to pour out all over everything and make sense of life again. Advent starts our relationship with Jesus all over again as we participate in the story of Mary’s expectancy. Mary was a young woman who grew plump with waiting for a baby and took us with her on that journey of waiting.
Can you wait a minute; I need a little more coffee to get started today. I still have some pumpkin spiced creamer from October. Yum. It’ll be a whole year before that comes back. That’s a lot of waiting, for a sweet little taste that goes in my coffee. You may not care, but I wait all year for pumpkin spice to return to the store shelves, but waiting on Jesus… how many good and faithful folks have given that up all together? How many robustly faithful people have given up waiting for Jesus because the meaning and message and experience of Jesus is lost or faded? The hope for anything joyous or life-giving got dumped over and fatigue has set in.
The prophet Isaiah says, “but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.” (Isaiah 40:31) Waiting offers us a brilliant gift! Seriously, waiting for God brings renewal, strength and restoration. I could use a little restoration right about now. Paul wrote to the people of Roman and told them, “but if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.” (Romans 8:25) I can see and taste pumpkin-spiced creamer, but what does the Lord look like and taste like and feel like? Hope, and cultivate patience.
Remember that Advent follows the journey from darkness ‘to’ light, from conception ‘to’ birth, and from death ‘to’ life. I remind you that we are living the ‘to’ or the middle or during the time of waiting. That means we are living during the time of pale light and shadows. Seeing Jesus come may bring some discomfort for your eyes to adjust to the brightness of God. Feeling hope and being restored will work some atrophied faith muscles that may have been forgotten. This journey of Advent isn’t a Hallmark kind of story, but it is the story of coming back to the life we most long for and the love we most desire. It is not a love that is fake or untrustworthy, but this love that God brings is true and steadfast! That’s worth the wait!
“For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation to all, training us to renounce impiety and worldly passions, and in the present age to live lives that are self-controlled, upright and godly, while we wait for the blessed hope and the manifestation of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ. He it is who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from all iniquity and purify for himself a people of his own who are zealous for good deeds.” (Titus 2:11-14)
It has been an exhausting year, but hope emerges when you least expect it. The laugh of a child, the song that sticks in your brain, the spirit of joy that is softly impatient return to us now. Get ready… shield your eyes… God is about to turn on the Light in the world again!
It has been an exhausting year, but hope emerges when you least expect it. The laugh of a child, the song that sticks in your brain, the spirit of joy that is softly impatient return to us now. Get ready… shield your eyes… God is about to turn on the Light in the world again!
God bless you and keep you, always,
Pastor Leigh Ann
great message of hope….
https://youtu.be/c2pxXYdJ2UY