Skip to main content

Advent and other waiting

   As I drove back last night from a Christmas party held in Bartlesville, I couldn't help but have the song "In the Waiting" by Greg Long run through my mind. When I turned my Ipod to this particular song, the opening few notes broke me. The subtle but simple guitar, the soft piano in the background, the tender opening lines: "Pain, the gift nobody longs for still it comes..." continued to break me.
   I haven't written anything yet about Advent, because I don't feel as though I have given this season of Advent enough time and energy. I have spent too much time focused on myself and what I wanted and have forgot to give any time to this season.
   Waiting...one of the hardest things that we as humans can do. I imagine that God allows us to have situations in our life that encourage us to wait for something...to anticipate. And the greatest situation we have been given is the birth of His Son, Jesus Christ. We, as Catholics, and other liturgical churches, celebrate the time before Christmas in anticipation for the first time we met our Savior, in anticipation for the second time we meet our Savior.
   Advent means arrival. Arrival. We are waiting for the arrival of something or event. And in the waiting for Christ, as I was listening to this captivating song, I also listened to the other parts of the song:
    "It seems the hardest part is waiting on You. When all I really want, is just to see your hand move."
I have been waiting for the subtle move of something. I feel as though I have spent the week in a stagnant state of nothing...of blahness. But this song rejuvenated within me a sense of something more. I knew that when I heard the chorus I would gain a sense of deeper peace.
    "I want a peace beyond my understanding. I want to feel it fall like rain, in the middle of my hurting. I want feel Your arms as they surround me, and let me know that it's okay, to be here in this place, resting in the peace that only comes...in the waiting."
   This is what it is about. The peace of advent. The stillness in the waiting. I knew at that moment that the stagnant moments of my week was just the stillness of my waiting. I knew then that I needed to take my focus off of myself and put it on others, but more importantly, put it on Christ. Long's words continued to give me the remembrance that I needed. I needed to remember that it is: "Time. Time to let it go and just believe. Trusting in what no one else but You can see."
    My humanity has been preoccupied, but God is bigger. And this advent season is not wasted. It is our time to wait in anticipation for the beauty of the One who brings the ultimate peace and understanding.

Happy 4th Sunday of Advent
   
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GqN6X-hd0nU

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Tiger must stay in your backpack...

   I'm not that parent. The one who gloats too much, and shows off all the pictures. The parent who relays every detail of their kid to let others know how incredible I think they are. Perhaps it is a flaw. Who knows. And I also pride myself in not being a helicopter parent. I teach and let go. I discipline and let go.    And I thought I would be ready for this: first day of Pre-K. I have been very positive and uplifting and have wanted my son to be extra ready to go to school. We have talked about it for months! I am ready... Or so I thought.  This morning, as white boy was leaving to take them to daycare, he said to Owen, "You can't take Tiger to school tomorrow or he will have to stay in your backpack, so do you want to take him to daycare today?" I thought little of it, but as Owen threw him down on the ground and turned to head out the door, my throat hitched. "Are you sure you don't want to take him today?" He said no. It was a sense of finality.  ...
Post a Comment
Read more

A goodbye love letter to you...

  I sat across from my dad at lunch, yesterday, and asked him, "Do you know what tomorrow is?" He said, "Yeah. 1 year." And his eyes grew damp. "I'll never forget walking into that room..." He didn't continue. I didn't ask him to. "I'll never forget the police officer banging on my door at 1130 at night..." I didn't continue. He didn't ask me to.  "This journal was given to me several years ago by my children. I know they wanted me to write down my thoughts to get through the rough times I was going through at the time. I did not start this at that time. Why am I starting it now? Well, I only thought I had been through hell back then, but now I realize I didn't have any idea what heartache was until Aug 15, 2010 -"   This is the beginning of one of my mother's journals. A journal she started a little over a month after Andy died. And she wrote it--to him.  "Dear Mother - Today is the day before Mothe...
Post a Comment
Read more

Arithmetic of Purpose

   By nature, humans will, at one point in their life, ask the question, "For what purpose? Why am I here? What am I meant to do?" Okay, maybe they will ask themselves more than 1 question...but at least around the same theme. "Who am I, and why am I here?" It is built in our very DNA. Growing up, I didn't ask this often. I had a loving family who went with the current. Who I was and why I was here was bound up in my place in my family of 4. I was comfy. I was loved. I was secure. But alas...the question presented itself.   I first asked myself this question walking down the streets of Rome. I was alone, I was 21, and I was lost. I had just finished AmeriCorps and felt like I wanted something, but wasn't sure what that was. I had found my faith, at last, and realized that perhaps I wanted to be a bigger part of the Church collective. I felt meaning to my nothingness. I went home with direction. I graduated from college, finally, and started grad school to be...
Post a Comment
Read more