From the UCC Network: Devotional for 11/28 "Advent is a Season I Love"

Advent is a Season I Love

Excerpt from Romans 13:11-14

“ . . . You know what time it is, how it is now the moment for you to wake from sleep.” 

Reflection by Anthony B. Robinson

I like Epiphany, I respect Lent, I wish we did Eastertide more and better, but it’s Advent that I love.

I love gathering greens from the cedars in our backyard to fold around the Advent wreath. I love the new purple candles, ready and waiting. I love getting out the silver candle snuffer that a college professor gave us as a wedding gift and laying it beside the wreath.

I love the first, haunting strains of “O Come, O Come Emmanuel,” on the first Sunday of Advent. I wait eagerly to sing, “Watchman Tell us of The Night,” and “On Jordan’s Bank the Baptist’s Cry.”

I like purple.

I love that when the stores’ Christmas decorations are already getting tired, Advent is just getting going. I love lighting candles around the house as evening comes and laying a fire in the fireplace. I like hanging the Advent calendar on the wall, and taking turns opening one window a day.

I like the waiting and the watching, and the anticipation. My grandmother, Victoria, used to say, when something good was coming, that she had, “The Anticipates.” Advent is a season for “The Anticipates.” It may be dark now, but a change is coming.

I like the Advent idea of “keeping faith, hope and love alive in the midst of dark times,” because that’s where we so often are and so often need to be. I love that, just when we want to hibernate, Advent says, “Wake up,” startling me like a noon factory whistle. “Wake up,” says Advent, “the world is open at the top.”

I love that when anxiety and fear seem to be so all-over-the-place, Advent’s call to be alert isn’t about fear but hope; that Advent isn’t for mad anxiety but glad urgency. I love the mystery of it.

Advent is a season I love.

Prayer

Wake us from sleep, O God, for the night is far gone, and the day is near.  Amen.

About the Author Tony Robinson, a United Church of Christ minister, is a speaker, teacher and writer. His most recent book isChanging the Conversation: A Third Way for Congregations. Read his weekly reflections on the current lectionary texts atwww.anthonybrobinson.com.