Reflection - 1st Sunday of Advent

I don’t know about you, but I hate waiting. If someone is going to pick me up to go play golf, and they are a few minutes late, I’m pacing the driveway, watching down the street to see if they’re coming. I hate waiting in line – especially if I’m in a long line of traffic and the light is going to change several times before I get there. Or how about the lines at the grocery store? Don’t you always try to find the shortest one? Don’t you avoid the register where the light is flashing, because that means a problem and delays? Those self-checkout counters are great – as long as I don’t have to wait too long. Some of us have waited – perhaps a long time – to hear if we finally got a job and would be able to support our family. Some of us have waited for the results of medical tests. Some of us are still waiting to see what kind of family gathering – if any – we will have during the pandemic. It’s probably safe to say that most of us don’t like watching and waiting; we want things to get done quickly.

Now along comes Advent and what do we hear? Watch and wait! Pay attention to something important that is yet to happen. It almost sounds like there is nothing for us to do, no part for us to play in the drama that is unfolding. Wrong. One of my favorite elements of Advent is its dual purpose – it’s not just a liturgical season for remembering the days before Christ’s birth; it is also a time set aside to welcome Jesus again into our lives and to anticipate his second, glorious coming. Advent does not demand that we be passive, simply standing and waiting for God to do his part. Rather, it is a time of eager anticipation, a time of preparation, in which we do all that we can do to open ourselves to everything the Lord is offering to us – his love, his mercy, his joy, his very self.

Psalm 46 says, “Be still and know that I am God.” That stillness is part of the watching and waiting of Advent. But sometimes it’s hard to be still. It's hard to be still when the company you worked so hard for downsizes you right out the door. It's hard to be still when you have a child who is deeply troubled. It's hard to be still as you watch a spouse or parent slip deeper and deeper into Alzheimer’s. It's hard to be still after you hear the doctor give the results of the tests, and the news isn't good. It's hard to be still when your parents' divorce is breaking your family apart. But it’s in those moments that the watching and waiting of Advent can be most meaningful – when what we have to look forward to is what Christmas is all about – God becoming alive and present and real in our life.

I was struck by a line in the first reading: “Why do you let us wander, O Lord, from your ways, and harden our hearts so that we fear you not.” It almost sounds like it’s God’s fault that we have wandered from him; that it’s God’s fault that our hearts are so hardened that we don’t even worry about what He thinks about how we live. But is it God’s fault or ours? I think we know the answer. So when we talk about Advent being about us waiting for God, it’s also about God waiting for us; about God being patient with us as he waits for us to open the doors of our hearts, to rid ourselves of whatever stands in the way of God living within us.

Our culture and society take a different way to watch and wait for Christmas. The countdown is well underway. Trees need decorating and presents need wrapped. Somewhere in all that is the stuff of everyday life – work, school, car pool, sports, paying bills, and running errands. There is so much to do and time is running out. The temptation is to live a “hurry up, get busy, go shopping, Christmas is almost here” kind of Advent. That is not the liturgical understanding of Advent. That kind of Advent can only lead to a “hurry up, get to church, open the presents, eat a big dinner, take down the tree, Christmas is over” kind of Christmas. In the midst of all this, we can miss what we are watching and waiting for.

If you have a brief faith reflection on today’s reading that you would like to share, please send it to me at deaconruss@holyspiritunoh.org.