Longing

Novelist and poet Reynolds Price wrote that there is one thing above all others that all human beings long to hear: that the "Maker of all things loves and wants me." 

During this season of Advent we lean forward in expectation of Christmas and the coming of the Messiah, but for far too many of us lose the plot this time of year.  

We fill our Advent days with worry, hurry and razor thin margins in our schedules.  We wonder why we are so tired, and stretched.  

And the entire time, we feel this sense of longing---a desire for something more, something meaningful, something that will give us the kind of peace and hope that can only come with knowing just how loved and desired we are by God.  

An ancient Hebrew poet fashioned a prayer to describe that longing when he wrote:  

"Will you not revive us again, that your people may rejoice in you?  Show us your unfailing love, Lord, and grant us your salvation."

So we rush headlong toward the moment when God entered into the world, changing history, altering reality and making all things new...  We hurtle toward God's great big declaration that God loves us and wants us... 

And if we are not alert and awake... we miss it.  

Which is why we need to carve out moments to see where God is at work around us and to hear God's voice speaking love over us during this season of Advent.  

Walter Brueggeman wrote: 

"If you do not want to miss out, you must pay attention to that other world, that unreasonable inexplicable world saturated with God's holiness, that is in the long run more decisive and more satisfying than the available world offers." 

May the grace and peace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you now and always. Amen.