For I tell you that many prophets and
kings desired to see what you see,
But did not see it, and to hear what
you hear but did not hear it. Luke
10:24
Since
Advent looks forward to Christ's birth and Incarnation, it is an appropriate
way to begin the Church Year. However, Advent is not part of the Christmas
season itself, but a preparation for it. Thus, Catholics do not sing Christmas
hymns, or use Christmas readings, in Mass until December 25th, the first day of
the Christmas season.
Many of us
are in an ideal place to begin Advent, but we don’t know it. It can be tempting
to think that, because we are struggling these days, we can’t enter into Advent
without a big change in our mood or without distancing ourselves from our real
experience. Nothing could be further from the truth. Advent is about letting
God come to us. We do the letting and God does the coming. And, the whole
mystery of our faith is that God is not reluctant to come into an unusual
relationship (like Mary and Joseph’s) or to be born in the poverty of a
makeshift stable. We are tempted to prepare for Advent by cleaning everything
up first – by, in effect, saving ourselves first. Our opening to Advent is to
realize we need saving and to accept the saving love of our God.
So, what
are we experiencing? That is the first Advent question. If we chew that
question, then the Isaiah reading will sound so good to our ears. Are we the
people “who walk in darkness” or have “thick clouds” over us? Is the way before
us full of valleys and hills? Does it seem like we are in a desert? Are there
wild beasts out there who are ready to devour us? Have we been guilty of some
things we aren’t proud of? Have we lost touch with who we really want to be?
Has our fidelity become a bit shabby? Then, Isaiah proclaims that our God is
ready to come and save us. And, none of the things that I see as barriers even
matter to God.
Then, is
Advent a passive season? No, we have work to do, but it is different from what
we first think it is. It starts with understanding what our preparation is. If
we haven’t prepared our hearts to be open to asking for salvation, we’ll never
shout, beg, plead, “Come, Lord, Jesus!” Our work is to become who we are.
Advent is a humble season, a season of self-awareness. To say it another way,
before we decorate our homes for Christmas, we have to clear away some of the
false masks we might wear. These made up identities help us be more
“presentable” to others, and at times they even fool us. When I look in the
mirror, which “me” do I see? There is nothing wrong with putting our best foot
forward in public, and it is quite understandable when we want others to see
our best selves. But, before our own consciences and before God, we want to be
transparent and real. We want to have no illusion. If there is struggle in my
life – and there has to be some struggle in all our lives – then we want to
acknowledge that before our God and to let that struggle be the door into
Advent’s graces.
How can we
have hope and expect God will come to us? The readings of Advent open up a
whole series of promises, full of powerful images, that keep reminding us that
our God will come to save us. They free our imaginations to see and experience
that coming with drama and joy – a banquet with “choice wines and rich, juicy
food.” They invite us to imagine when “a time will come for singing.” They give
us the opportunity to hope beyond our wildest hopes in the past – “the lion
will lie down with the lamb” and “they will prepare for war no more.” They open
our hearts to imagine the love of our God embracing us in the coming of one
like us, who knows our life and its struggles and offers us the hope of the
Spirits presence with us every day, in every moment.
What are
the key first steps to enter into Advent? We can all slow down. We can all
breathe more deeply. We can all begin to trust that this will be a blessed
time. Then, when we let ourselves be who we are, and hear the Scriptures, we
can begin to quietly pray, “Come, Lord, Jesus.” We might expand that prayer, in
quiet moments of our days ahead, “Come into my life. I trust you don’t mind if
it is still messy. I believe you love me, because I need your love. I don’t
fear you can’t find the way to my heart. Come and fill me with peace and the
love only you can give.” Some of us will want to open our hands on our laps or
hold up our arms in the privacy of our rooms and say out loud, “Come, Lord,
Jesus, come into this house, into my family, into our struggles. Come and heal
us, and give us join again. Come and unite us and let us experience, each in
our own way, a bit of the joy you are offering me now.”
And,
before a single decoration goes up, we have prepared for Christmas’ message
with the foundation of faith, with the mystery of Advent’s gift. God wants to
be with us. Advent is letting God’s will be done in our hearts and in our
everyday lives.
The Two Parts of Advent
Part
1: up until December 16
While most
liturgical seasons have the gospel as their main focus, during the first weeks
of Advent, the Church gives us daily readings from the prophet Isaiah. With the eyes of faith, these foretell the
coming of the Messiah. Rather than a continuous gospel narrative familiar to us
for most of the year, this part of Advent offers a wide variety of gospel
readings that support the first reading of the day.
After
almost two weeks of Isaiah readings, we hear the foretelling of a Messiah from
other prophets from the Hebrew scriptures - in Sirach, Numbers, Zephaniah and
returning to Isaiah. With each passing week, the prophets speak more clearly of
the coming of a Savior.
So, in
reading the first reading, for the first part of Advent, we listen to the anticipation,
expectation, hope and promise. In
listening to the second reading, we listen for the fulfillment or connection
with the gospel.
Part
2: December 17 - 24
In these
last eight days before Christmas, the relationship between the readings changes. Now the gospel brings us to our celebration
of Christmas. The gospels are taken from
the infancy narratives of Matthew and Luke.
Each of
these days, the first reading is taken from the Hebrew scriptures, and chosen
to match the gospel. In many cases we
can imagine Matthew or Luke having the first reading open on their desks while
they wrote the gospel.
So, we can
read the gospel first and then read the first reading. The sense of anticipation and fulfillment
builds as we read the story of the preparation for Jesus' first coming into
this world for us.
The Three Comings of Jesus
While
Considering One, We Prepare for Another
One way of
really enriching our Advent journey is to keep in mind the three comings of
Jesus, and how they relate to one another.
Jesus was
born into our history - at a fixed point in time in the past. Jesus comes to us now, in a whole variety of
ways. Jesus promised that he will come
again in glory, at the end of time.
The
Incarnation: Jesus has come
This is
not the coming we await. The first
coming of Jesus has already happened.
Our preparation to celebrate his birth is the occasion for our deeper
reflection. On the first level, it is so
important that we really let ourselves experience the power of the
Incarnation: God is with us. That God became one of us means that
"human" is one of the ways God can be. The deeper we contemplate this mystery the
more we enter into the grace of "God with us." The more we let ourselves be touched by this
mystery, the more we see the connection between Christmas and Easter: all of this is "for me" - for my
salvation - to free me from the power of sin and death.
My Life
Now: Jesus comes to me
When we
open our hearts and our mouths and plead, "Come, O Lord," we are most
directly experiencing our desire for the Lord to come to us and touch us with
the grace of salvation - that we might live it with greater freedom and
peace. Jesus is present whenever we need
him to be present: actually, whenever we
turn to him - even with empty hands.
Jesus is alive and active in us when we read God's Word and let it into
our hearts. Jesus promised to be present with us whenever two or three are
gathered together in his name. And, we
know Jesus comes to us whenever our sacrifices and our sufferings unite us with
his own mission. Advent is a special time to experience our longing for the
presence of Jesus with us now - in all the places we need him most.
Our
Future: Jesus comes again, in glory
One of the
most transforming graces of Advent is given us as our longing deepens. The more grateful we become for how God saved
us in Jesus, the more deeply we enter into the mystery of how Jesus is with us
now. The closer we come to experiencing
joy at how our Lord, Jesus Christ came into our world, faithful to God and
faithful to our life journey in the flesh, the closer we come to experiencing
the mystery of salvation in our everyday lives.
And, as our longing is filled with the utter fullness of God's gift to
us, we begin to long with the ultimate freedom:
we long to be with him in God. We
live more at home in this world because our God made a home in this world. But the whole story draws us to a complete
picture of who we are and where we belong.
Then our prayer begins to change, in our hearts and on our lips. We still are singing, "Come, Lord,
Jesus!" but our song is transformed into the free and complete song of the
lover: "Come, and take me with
you."
Now we watch for the day,
hoping that the salvation promised us will be ours
when Christ will come again
in his glory.
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