Waiting for Good Things

Last week in our church bulletin, I saw a mention of Advent as a season of waiting. I started thinking of how long people waited for the Messiah, whose presence we now take for granted. But there were long, dark days, and years, and centuries, when people had to begin to wonder if God had forgotten them. I started to write a blog post on that topic, and then started thinking it sounded vaguely familiar. Sure enough, I wrote something similar awhile back. So in the spirit of recycling and going green and destressing and all that, I decided to share that one with you again:

Do you ever feel that Christmas comes rushing at you like a locomotive--even worse, a locomotive you didn't expect?

How does that happen? One minute, it's October and I'm snickering at the Christmas stuff in stores, because it's still AGES away. And it seems like a few days later, I'm rushing around in a panic because I can't possibly get everything done before the big day.

It wasn't always that way, though. I remember when I was a child, Christmas seemed to take forever to arrive. Even in December, even as we sat at school making construction paper ornaments, the days seemed endless. Three more weeks? That was practically a lifetime, especially when I was waiting for a new Barbie doll and a stack of Nancy Drew books.

Twice in the past week, my church has equated the Advent season with waiting. Tom Anderson, one of our pastors, wrote a beautiful article in our church newsletter, the Pipeline. He said,"Advent is a time of waiting in a culture that has grown impatient, it is a time of hoping ina dark, dangerous place where despair seems too often just around the corner, a time of preparation in a 'fast food, microwave' driven world. It is a time to stop, to watch, to wonder, but most of all, a time to wait.

"We wait for the birth of God into the world, for what the prophet Isaiah longed for, when from exile he cried, 'O that you would tear open the heavens and come down, so that the mountains would quake at your presence.' We wait for nothing more and nothing less than God in the season of Advent, knowing that above and beyond all of our needs, none is more radical, moreprofound, and more essential than this One..."

Our bulletin/worship program last Sunday featured an excerpt from The Worship Sourcebook, (Calvin Institute for Worship): "The season of Advent, a season of waiting, is designed to cultivate our awareness of God's actions--past, present, and future. In Advent we hear the prophecies of the Messiah's coming as addressed to us--people who wait for the second coming. In Advent we heighten our anticipation for the ultimate fulfillment of all Old Testmanent promises, when the wolf will lie down with the lamb, death will be swallowed up, and every tear will be wiped away."

This reminds me I need to slow down, to enjoy that sweet season of anticipation. To remember the "reason for the Season." To acknowledge the beauty of waiting on God.