Take Heart

“By deliberately attaching our given days to their holy antecedents, we are able to glimpse an eternal significance embodied in our every moment—redeeming our days from what might otherwise be a melancholy emptiness.”

-Scott Cairns

       This is the first time that I have fully celebrated advent, and it has dramatically changed how I’ve approached the Christmas season.  In the past, December has always been a joyful month, but mainly in anticipation for Christmas celebrations with friends and family.  All focus during this time of year is typically spent in preparations for these long-awaited gatherings set in glittering and spotless homes of the finest hosts.  My eager self spends the month constructing gingerbread houses, baking cookies, and driving all over the congested parking lots of high-end shopping centers and Target stores in search of the perfect gift. All reflections of Bethlehem and that holy night are pushed aside, only to be forced back into my mind on Christmas day, when it seems most appropriate.  Of course, by the time December 25’th arrives, I’m so emotionally exhausted that I can’t bring myself to reflect on the wonder of a Christ child in a waiting world.  By January 1’st, I find myself sitting in a room of new gifts, overcome with guilt, wondering how I managed to avoid Jesus another Christmas season.

       This holiday season, I’ve been reflecting on Jesus everyday.  It hasn’t been some sort of pious praise fest, in which I claim to be overjoyed each day.  However, it has been a month of thinking on God’s promises.  I’ve been struck by how good God is to follow through with his promises, even if they aren’t fulfilled the way I’d anticipate. That’s nothing new—even during the time of Christ’s birth, mankind has been assuming that they know when, why, and how God will fulfill His plans.  A humble child is certainly not what Israel had in mind. 

       My advent readings have also gotten me thinking about the theme of waiting, which is something I find myself doing a lot here in Mundri.  I wait for meetings, for people, for seasons, for change.  I tend to approach waiting with a negative attitude, given over to frustration and discontent at what is yet to be.  However, I have been learning to be content in waiting, to find joy in the hope of what is to come.  Before Christ’s birth, the world waited in eager anticipation for the coming of the Savior king.  They experienced “the paradox of joy, in the midst of desire,” because they trusted in God’s promises.  This posture of hopeful waiting has given me patience to endure those everyday trials—the lesson plan that flops, the miscommunication in the market, the setbacks in knowing and understanding the people here. The prophet Isaiah tells us that, “those who wait upon the Lord will renew their strength.”  If that’s the case, then the people here in S. Sudan are certainly building up their strength each day.   

Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart

and wait for the Lord.

-Psalm 27:14

If anyone is looking for a good advent book for next year, I highly recommend 

God With Us: Rediscovering the Meaning of Christmas

Ed. Greg Pennoyer/Gregory Woolfe