Monday, December 1, 2014

Advent: Wait For It!

Advent 1
1 Corinthians 1:3-9

Who has been to Disney World?  Did you know that buried and built deep under the ground of Cinderella’s castle is a bunker called “The Disney Operational Command Center”?  It is the “brains” of the park designed to address the single most challenging problem Disney exec’s believe a visitor has to contend with – waiting in line.

I haven’t seen pictures – but according to what I read – the bunker is filled with flat-screen TVs displaying live feeds of all the rides and their lines – with green, yellow and red outlines so the watchers can see which lines are heading towards trouble.

When they start flashing red – someone in the command center might alert an operator of the ride to launch more boats, or send out more cars so more people can get off the line and on the ride.   Or they may ask Goofy or Snow White to head over and entertain the people while they wait.  Disney wants to do anything they possibly can to keep you occupied and distracted.

Because as the VP of the park was quoted as saying – “all those waiting moments really add up.”  (NYTimes 12/28/10)

I wonder if he has any idea of the theological depth of that statement….for yes indeed, all our waiting moments really add up.

We’re in a waiting period right now – aren’t we?  Christmas is the big event at the end of the line – but I’d offer that we have a choice as to which line we wait on.  Let’s call the first line the “holiday train.”  This is the Black Friday, Cyber Monday, Pumpkin Latte’s turned to Peppermint Mocha’s, door-busting deals at every store so you can decorate that house until it looks like the Southern Living catalog of Norman Rockwell Christmas perfection that we’re told is bound to make us happy!  On this line, people seem to wait anxiously; always fretting over all there is to do, surrounded by all the distractions and delusions that as long as they procure enough of the “stuff” out there, they will finally feel happy and complete in “here.”  It’s a Christmas all about holiday spirit, good cheer and being nice.  Which is not really anything to do with the in-breaking of God via the Incarnation of Jesus Christ.

Or, we can opt for the other line that we call Advent.  Advent is not intended to distract or entertain you.  Quite the opposite.  The waiting is where the focus is.  The waiting is the spiritual practice meant to prepare our hearts like we prepare the soil before spring planting.  We tend to what is going on in us.  We listen and question and think about where we are right now, with ourselves, with God.  It’s leaning into the waiting to help us focus and pay attention and get ready.

But – it’s hard!  Not gonna lie that kind of waiting requires intentionality and being entertained and distracted is just plain easier.  The one time in my life where I felt like I was able to live into the waiting was when it was sort of forced on me.  My daughter, Dorothea, was born on December 29th – and she was due Christmas eve.  So my Advent in 2004 was all about waiting!

Now of course before I got pregnant – I heard many times about how wonderful pregnancy is – lots of women say – I loved being pregnant.  Well not this woman!  My back hurt all the time – feet and ankles swollen – had terrible heartburn.  Sleeping?  It didn’t matter how many special pillows I bought, I never got comfortable.  And that December was the last month.  I was living in Queens in New York and working in Manhattan down in Tribeca.  So every day I took the train 45 minutes into the city – and in Queens it’s an elevated train – so there were all the stairs up to the station – all the stairs up to the platform – all the stairs up to the sidewalk once you got into Manhattan.  I remember one weekday coming home from work and I had walked the five blocks back to me street and I remember standing on the corner – my apartment was about ¾ down the block – and you know how they do in the movies when they show something far away and then zoom the camera somehow so the distance seems to triple?  Well I stood on that corner, stared down that block and that seemed to happen and I thought – I’m just going to sit down right here.  Surely someone or several someone’s will just come along eventually and carry me home.  Just didn’t think I could make it. Couldn’t wait any more!

But, of course I did.  And all of you in here – especially those of you with first- hand experience – know that no matter the hardships I wouldn’t trade it for the world, in fact I’d take double – because I knew what I was waiting for.  I was waiting to give birth to my daughter – waiting to meet a person that I had a part in creating.  Waiting to bring love into my life – into the world.  Waiting for the gift of God (Dorothea) that is beyond words – truly miraculous.

That feeling – hopeful expectation – is a gift of the faith-filled life and what Advent is all about. It is the waiting that Paul describes in his letter to his church in Corinth –  I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that has been given you in Christ Jesus, for in every way you have been enriched in him, in speech and knowledge of every kind….so that you are not lacking in any spiritual gift as you wait for the revealing of God.

Hopeful expectation comes when we trust that God has already done something in us – God has already planted the seed – started us on a path.  The priest and writer Henri Nouwen said – “Active waiting means to be present fully to the moment, in the conviction that something is happening where you are and you want to be present to it.”

That’s the hopeful expectation of Mary, of Joseph, the shepherds, the Magi, John the Baptist, all the people in scripture believe God has started something in them!

And, the thing is, as we wait for the revealing – God is waiting for us to reveal those seeds God has planted.  God is waiting for us to reveal the light in our hearts.  God is waiting for us to give birth to the child of God, God created us to be.

So for those of you who want to skip the holiday train ride, and hop on the Advent waiting line I offer this practice – each day, at any point in the day – simply look around and pay attention.  Be present fully to the moment with the conviction that something is happening and God is there.  Name for yourself what is the grace God has given you in speech and knowledge and being that is being birthed in you.

May all of us enter into Advent time, in the words of Isaiah, remembering that we are the clay and God is the potter, and all those waiting moments are the work of God’s hands.  The moments that create our very lives and don’t we want to pay attention to that!  Because in each and every one of them – God is doing something in us and breaking into our lives all the time.  Keep awake for God is faithful.  Amen.

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