Monday, November 30, 2015

Devotion - Monday, November 30

An informal survey confirmed for me what I had feared - not that many of us were in worship yesterday.  (I was on vacation myself - taking advantage of the Thanksgiving Break.)  The rush to return to school, the putting away of Thanksgiving dishes, or the putting up of Christmas trees - for a variety of reasons, many of us missed yesterday's observance of Advent 1.

Advent is 4 Sundays long.  It ends with the announcement of the birth in Bethlehem.  It began yesterday.

These weeks are to be given over to preparing and anticipating; to looking for Messiah and looking for how Messiah might change our world.

Waiting and watching do not come easy to us.  Particularly in the world which swirls around us these days.

The acts of violence which have dominated our world have united us in some ways; divided us in others.  We are united in our disgust; divided on how to respond.  Christians are themselves divided.

Advent would encourage us to put off responding until we have reflected and envisioned the end toward which God is calling us.  Advent would remind us that our short-term goals should not be in conflict with the eternal vision of God for His creation.

Too few of us were in worship yesterday; too few of us are prepared for the discipline of Advent.  But we can get prepared, and ready, and we can make straight the pathway of Messiah.  We can.  Will we?

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