The True Spirit of Advent

Every advent, every coming, every appearance involves waiting.

If you're like me, just saying the word "wait," brings a measure of unsettledness to my soul.  

So, during times when I am put on hold, I have this tendency that leans toward the glass-half-empty-syndrome and impatience; so, in my waiting, there's an added discomfort.

I've also experienced life-lulls that are accompanied by anxiety over the uncertainty; even some dread and, yes, frustration over how slowly time passes during the waiting.

This time of year, my mind always travels back to Bay's cancer surgery (which came just weeks prior to Christmas) and that sterile, cold hospital waiting room. 

There I sat (with all the above emotions) between the now and not yet of knowing how our future would pivot with the diagnosis we'd just received a couple days prior, and what the doctor would tell me when he "advented" out of that surgery theater. 

But, Bay's cancer scare isn't the focus on my mind this morning. 

Waiting is. 

Advent is a season of waiting. 

We can't change it.

It will always remind us we live between the then, the now, and not yet. 

BUT, while in between the now and not yet, we can't leave out "the then" of the manger.

Instead of setting my mind on a sterile waiting room with out-dated magazines, weak coffee, and those all-consuming what-ifs, there's another place for my thoughts to travel: where life pivoted drastically for the better. 

There in my place of waiting, I can choose to live in the negative emotions of frustration, dread, anxiety, uncertainty, and discomfort; or, because of the manger, I can focus on THE PROMISE it holds.

Advent is an invitation to choose.

I have the privilege of choosing between the malaise of the wait or the hope of the manger.

There at the manger, I was given the gift of HOPE!

Because of hope, I am filled anew with GREAT JOY!

Joy spills over into PEACE that passes all understanding.

With those three (hope, joy, peace), I am stirred to live as Jesus lived: a life of love.

The cure for sterile, cold waiting rooms? 

It's always a FOCUS BACK on a cradle in a barn... 

...a babe that came in the fulness of time to be Immanel (God-WITH-us) in the now... 

...a salvation through His shed blood that covers all our sin...

...and, a resurrection that is inherent in our new spiritual DNA, when we receive the gift of that salvation...

...and, the HOPE of HEAVEN...and, this truth: He is coming again!

The manger is my promise of a greater tomorrow.

So, instead...Here's the lesson I've pondered the last few days:

Let there be inside every wait...in every"not yet," a SPIRIT OF ADVENT that allows us to be full of hope, joy, peace, and love, which carry us beyond the pale into ADVENTURE and great ANTICIPATION. 

This really is THE MOST WONDERFUL TIME OF THE YEAR...

...when our focus is on JESUS!