We find ourselves at the start of a journey. Advent is a season that leads us to the heart of Christmas. And through these four weeks, we’d like to take a journey through some “postures of the season”. How do we make more meaning of this season than decorating and gift-buying? How do we get from here to there in a way that can feed our spirits, calm our minds and strengthen our hearts to moderate, to find quiet, and to seek significance in these 4 weeks.
One of the stories of this season from the Christian tradition goes like this:
The angel Gabriel visited a young woman named Mary who was engaged to be married to a man named Joseph, who was descended from David. Mary heard the words: “Greetings. You are beautiful inside and out. You are blessed, you are favoured, you are important.” At hearing this, Mary was thoroughly shaken, wondering what was behind such a greeting. She heard reassurance: “Mary, you have nothing to fear. You will become pregnant and give birth to a son and call him Jesus. Luke 1: 26-31
Afterward, the story continues as visits her cousin Elizabeth and ponders (and even sings) about the child growing within her. The imagery in this song – called The Magnificat – is full of hopes but also danger about what this child will bring. We hear about things happening: about the poor being fed and the rich being sent away empty, about the proud being overthrown, and the lowest being lifted up; and just generally about the great reversal of fortune that would come as a result of the child Mary was carrying. Not necessarily comforting thoughts for an expecting parent.
If this is how the story of working our way toward Christmas begins – with the hopes and fears of a young mother. We also can – sort of like pilgrims – follow a similar path…with hopes and dreams to be born, burdened with the fears of all that can harm and all that betray the sweet young dreams that may be before us on that path.
For young expecting parents, it takes patience, and it takes waiting and watching. Noticing the light in the dark, the reasons to be positive in the chaos of change and challenge. This is a parent’s job. If all we saw was the danger and fear, nobody would want to be a parent at all. But the job is to see beyond and deeper. And it’s our job too on our journey toward Christmas – to be on notice for the signs of hope and the ways in which dreams will find their way to reality.
One important posture of Advent is that of watching, of staying alert to the goodness growing and being born in the world.
Claudia Highbaugh’s writing is helpful here:
Watching for signs and being on guard and attentive to the natural world around us—the world of wonders and change—inform the ability to live through difficult circumstances and make our way to something new that only comes after much labour.
Watching for goodness and signs of life and growth and hope doesn’t mean we have our Pollyanna “rose-colored glasses” on where we put a happy spin on everything. We can with “eyes wide open” acknowledge the deep trauma and wounds in our world, while still believing and working for something better, knowing that it is possible to work toward a world “as it could be.”
This reminds me of a great scene from Lord of the Rings: The Two Tower. Sam and Frodo are on an epic journey to take the ring to Mount Doom to destroy it. They were surrounded by a fellowship of people to help them, and now it’s just the two of them facing one life-threatening obstacle after another. At his lowest, Frodo gets encouragement from his ever faithful best friend, Sam.
FRODO: I can’t do this, Sam.
SAM: I know. It’s all wrong. By rights we shouldn’t even be here. But we are. It’s like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger they were. And sometimes you didn’t want to know the end. Because how could the end be happy. How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened.
But in the end, it’s only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come. And when the sun shines it will shine out the clearer. Those were the stories that stayed with you, that meant something. Even if you were too small to understand why. But I think, Mr. Frodo, I do understand. I know now. Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back only they didn’t. Because they were holding on to something.
FRODO: What are we holding on to, Sam?
SAM: That there’s some good in this world, Mr. Frodo. And it’s worth fighting for.
In this season of preparation, can we prepare ourselves to see the world through Advent eyes? The signs of disaster are easy to see. The deficits of time, money, kindness and love are easy to see. Flooding and new letters of the Greek alphabet are easily in our sights. It’s easy to notice the aches and pains. Can we see the signs of hope? Can we define what we are holding on to? Can we see the good in the world, Mr. Frodo, and know it’s worth fighting for?
It takes awareness, it takes watching, and it takes work to do this in each of our lives. This is a season of hope and so we have to exercise the muscles that keep hope alive in our lives. By noticing, by working to watch and to see.
There’s a quote in one of my favourite novels entitled “The Elegance of the Hedgehog” by Muriel Barbery. It’s spoken by the main character, Paloma, who’s twelve. She has to deal with her more immature older sister who has just been with her to visit their grandparents. Her sister wants nothing to do with the reality of a nursing home, aging, and the harsh reality that they force us to confront. But Paloma is desperately searching for signs of life that will inspire her to make it to adulthood. This comes from the chapter entitled “Profound Thought No. 8”:
“If you dread tomorrow, it’s because you don’t know how to build the present, and when you don’t know how to build the present, you tell yourself you can deal with it tomorrow, and it’s a lost cause because tomorrow always ends up becoming today.”
Like Paloma, we have to live with some certainties – that human life tends to have certain givens – loss, change, death, unpredictability, chaos.
And within that certainty, our goal is to build something. To be attentive to the moment we’re in and make use of it.
Awareness takes place in the course of our minute-by-minute existence.
Advent is about watching. We’re convinced that there is value and meaning and beauty in life, and so that notion calls on us to be on constant lookout for the signs of life? How can we discover it if we are not vigilant about seeing possibility and hope and love around us, when more often than not, it can go unnoticed, unrecognized, passed by in our busyness and sleepiness, and rote motions.
Neil Pasricha has discovered the wonder and value of it. His book, The Book of Awesome is an incredible look at the power of attentiveness. His list of awesome things is enough to inspire your own. Listen and appreciate these few:
- Multitasking while brushing your teeth;
- When you pull up to a red light and the guy in front of you nudges up a bit so you can make a right turn.
- Wearing clothes just out of the dryer
- The sound of scissors cutting construction paper (thank you, Mr. Dressup)
- A long hug when you really need one
- Peeling an orange in one shot.
Our job on the way toward Christmas is to be awake to constant glimpses of all that’s entirely beautiful, sacred and amazing…by watching, by being attentive. Like Mary, Like Frodo and Sam, like Paloma, we work everyday at noticing it, then building it and creating it, making it so. That is what we’re made for: for building the present.” Let’s get on with doing it…in so many ways.
Normal day, let me be aware of the treasure you are. Let me learn from you, love you, bless you before you depart. Let me not pass you by in quest of some rare and perfect tomorrow. Let me hold you while I may, for it may not always be so. One day I shall dig my nails into the earth, or bury my face in the pillow, or stretch myself taut, or raise my hands to the sky and want, more than all the world, your return. ~Mary Jean Iron
-Chris New
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