Advent Devotional

by Matt Kuzma

Growing up, my favorite day of the holiday season was not Christmas morning; it was December 13. On that day, my brother and I could open the huge box that my Aunt Linda would send to us each year. She sent each of us 12 presents, dated December 13-24. It was the most amazing thing, being able to open presents each morning two whole weeks before anyone else! Let me tell you, 10-year-old Matthew had no doubt if you asked him who, besides his parents, loved him the most in the whole world: Aunt Linda.

When I grew up, I learned about all the other things my aunt had done for me: watching me and my brother during the day when my mom had to go to work, teaching me sign language and how to read my older cousins’ books, showing me how to be kind. Aunt Linda died of cancer several years ago, but 33-year-old Matthew still has no doubt about who loved me the most in the whole world.

Advent to me is like God giving us a big box of presents. On Christmas, we celebrate the amazing gift of Jesus, but each morning leading up to it, we open up a small present. Inside, we find life, hope, and another 24 hours to love each other and change the world. Go ahead, open one.

by Brit Holmberg

I’ve found that expectations can be both a blessing and a curse. On one hand, they are vital for establishing a sense of order, as well as keeping hope afloat. For example, I expect that the city will pick up our garbage and dispose of it properly. I expect that my flight will leave and arrive on time. I also expect that justice will prevail in our world – that God is actively working to undo oppression. That wrongdoing will be exposed and rectified. And that peace (shalom) is possible; that one day soon, the lion will lay down with the lamb and we will turn our swords into plowshares. Without such fundamental expectations, my life would feel chaotic, and lack purpose.

But I’ve learned that having unrealistic expectations is as problematic as not having any expectations at all. Expecting too much from myself, a loved one, an elected official, a client, or even God often leads to disappointment, resentment, and frustration. Rigid expectations can blind us to reality and cause us to miss the holy, life-giving moments of our lives.

We need to look no further than the Christmas story for confirmation of this fact. The Jews of Jesus’ time were hungry for a Messiah. Based on their history and prophets, they had come to expect this Messiah to come in the form of a royal king and a mighty warrior who would free Israel from Roman oppression. Most were unprepared when Jesus, a common laborer born to an unwed mother, announced that he was the Son of God and began performing miracles in God’s name. As his reputation grew, many believed, but many held fast to their long-held expectation of who the Messiah would be. In so doing, they missed out on the powerful thing that God was doing in their lives and the wider community.

This Advent, I encourage you to take stock of the expectations you have for yourself, your loved ones, and your faith. I invite you to reflect on the expectations you have that are life-sustaining and the ones that prevent you from seeing God’s presence in your life. Consider how God is working to challenge your expectations to create a more just, loving, and peaceful earth.

by Cindy Kuzma

“Compassion is a muscle that gets stronger with use. And the regular exercise of choosing kindness over cruelty would change us.” – Jonathan Safran Foer

This past year, I got certified as a running coach, and started working to help other runners reach their goals. In a training plan, each workout has a purpose, making the runner faster, stronger, better. Mile repeats build speed. Long runs build endurance. Hill runs build power.

For most of us, this type of “practice makes perfect” makes sense when it comes to physical pursuits. We don’t often think about moral and spiritual endeavors—compassion, patience, justice—in the same way. Advent offers us an opportunity to reconsider this narrow view.

This season, we’re asked to live with hope, work for justice, wait with joy, and prepare for love. You’re not alone if you find yourself a little rusty in these areas. Even if we can squeeze in a trip to the gym, our daily lives don’t always leave much room for contemplation or preparation. Nevermind the often-catalogued physical hustle and bustle of the holiday season—for some of us, this spiritual to-do list can be just as daunting.

It may help to think a little bit more like a runner. You don’t start a plan with a 26-mile dash; each shorter distance covered builds toward a marathon effort. Similarly, a small spiritual workout each day—a kind gesture, a moment of meditation, a peaceful thought—leads to exponential benefits. Train your body hard enough, and you’ll notice its shape start to transform—your waist shrinks, your quads grow, your muscles become more defined. Train your soul hard enough, and you’ll notice the world transform.

by Liz Dierbeck

In Chicago, as everyone knows, you will one day become a victim of holiday traffic.

If you live in Chicago long enough, you start to understand the grid system and its idiosyncrasies; you predict which major thoroughfares are most likely to be clogged with tourists and holiday shoppers; you anticipate the collective insanity that ensues whenever the weather changes significantly. You even even grow accustomed to tacking on an extra 30 minutes to your travel time. You need those precious 30 minutes, even if it’s just in your mind, because without them you will arrive late, frazzled and road-weary. Better to set yourself and your hosts up for hazards and disappointments, than to count on an even-keeled trip across town to make merry.

As any of Oprah’s spiritual gurus will tell you, if you “think positive,” you can obtain or achieve anything. They describe it as if you are drawing an idea, a possibility, an experience closer and closer to yourself, and fully into your life, by a slender silver cord woven together by thought and belief. (It is clear that these “gurus” have never driven on Lake Shore Drive after the first snowfall.)

But I have personally found success in this concept of “expecting” good things. It’s as simple as writing down a personal goal, and sticking the post-it note to my computer screen. That paper square boldly proclaims: I have a vision of how my life could become better, and I’m giving myself some mental space, and extra time, to consider that something wild and new might be possible for me. It becomes a daily witness, each time I catch sight of it: a silent, yellow prayer-turned-pep-talk. It doesn’t have to happen today, but the day will come when that post-it turns into reality, and all because I dared to believe it could be so.

The season of Advent is a daily progression toward an audacious event. God wrote down the idea of far-reaching, ever-lasting change, and He stuck it to our collective mental “screen.” Every day for the next 28 days, we can think about that promise, and make it a little more real by drawing it closer, into our lives. We can take extra time and mental space to “re-calibrate” our own expectations. Even when our commitments require us to battle long lines and traffic to live up to the expectations of others, we can still engage daily with God in waiting, and create something new that once was impossible.

by Rob Rawls

Advent begins again today.

Ordinary time, if there is such a thing, is over and the Christian calendar begins again. In a way, today can be looked at as a Christian New Year. A time to begin again. As a community, we prepare to welcome the incarnation. Emanuel. God with us.

Advent begins today. The spiritual journey towards Christmas morning. Twenty-seven days. As a child, these days after Thanksgiving would creep and crawl. As an adult, they can slip by way too fast–a calendar overstuffed with work parties, trips to the mall, and an exhausting effort to fill every day with holiday joy. We look forward to those brief, elusive moments where we feel complete; the one we remember from childhood surrounded by new toys  and the ones from a few years ago when the music was perfect and the house was warm.

We know that these moments pass quickly–but still we wait for them. It seems that Advent can be all about waiting and distracting ourselves from waiting. We hurry around confident that soon we won’t just be waiting, but we’ll finally experiencing.

On this first morning of Advent, this New Year’s morning, I challenge you to create an Advent resolution this year. I challenge you to take some to time to experience this time, this period in your life, this place where you are. God is with you. Not just some time in a few weeks or when the music is right and the house is warm.

Right here and right now.

————-

The Communications Committee is very happy to again work with the members of the Holy Covenant community to offer the Advent Blog. During the Advent season, we’ll publish a new devotion every morning. We encourage you to check the blog every day, comment on the thoughts that inspire and encourage you, and use this as one of the ways that you experience the season.

If you have any questions or would like to submit a blog post, please email the Communications Committee at communications@holycovenantumc.org.