Beloved of God,
Advent begins this Sunday (November 30), and the past few weeks I’ve found myself awaiting this season more eagerly than usual.
Advent is a season of longing and hope, where we are reminded that we can’t just fix the problems we face by trying a little harder or getting a little smarter. We must wait for God to do what only God can do, and then surrender to what God is doing as best we can. But the outcome of God’s work and our surrender is never predetermined, and never up to us.
This may tempt us to despair, feeling as though our only two options are anxious striving and apathetic cynicism, but the gospel of Jesus gives us a new option: hope!
Psychologist and philosopher Erich Fromm says this about hope:
Hope is paradoxical. It is neither passive waiting nor is it unrealistic forcing of circumstances that cannot occur. It is like a crouched tiger, which will jump only when the moment for jumping has come… To hope means to be ready at every moment for that which is not yet born… Those whose hope is strong see and cherish all signs of new life and are ready every moment to help the birth of that which is ready to be born.
This Advent, I want to cultivate that kind of hope: cherishing all signs of life, even as we sit in darkness and the shadow of death, and staying ready every moment to help birth whatever goodness and beauty is ready to be born, as we await the dawn, when Jesus will come again to set the world right and make all things new.
Here is how we will be cultivating this kind of hope together during Advent this year. Will you join us? We are:
- Cultivating silence in the sanctuary on Sunday mornings from 10:15-10:30am,
- A Sunday morning 9am Advent kids class,
- Starting Dec 7, Rethinking Eschatology on Sunday mornings at 9am (heaven, hell, judgment),
- Praying Compline on Sunday evenings at 9pm,
- Praying in homes around Advent Wreaths (download a liturgy you can use),
- Making space for grief at our Longest Night Service: Mon Dec 22 at 7pm, and
- Celebrating with joy (and so many candles!) at our Christmas Eve Service: December 24 at 4pm.
I hope you’ll join us in cultivating hope this Advent. In the meantime, Happy Thanksgiving! I invite you to consider using the Collect for Thanksgiving Day from our Book of Common Prayer:
Almighty and gracious Father, we give you thanks for the fruits of the earth in their season and for the labors of those who harvest them. Make us, we pray, faithful stewards of your great bounty, for the provision of our necessities and the relief of all who are in need, to the glory of your Name; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
Yours in Christ,
Fr. Ben
