Wholehearted

 Friday of the Third Week of Advent

Make me hear of joy and gladness,
that the body you have broken may rejoice.
Psalm 51:9

The naked tree limbs etched across the pale winter sky remind me of the bareness through which Advent often winds. When the way is hard, gladness seems remote—and I have been on this way much longer than the number of purple-blue days on the calendar. 

I do not seek ungrounded joy, or a happiness that glosses over despair, singing without acknowledging those who weep. I want to sing to the pain in the world, to meet it where it sits, and invite it to lessen its suffocating grip. And I bend my ears toward the songs of others that are honest, soulful, heartfelt.

To be wholehearted is to bring to any moment all that the heart contains: Old loves, fresh sorrows, long-practiced rhythms, well-worn treasures, new delights, curated wisdom, expansiveness.

May I wholeheartedly give in to this season, and remember that in the dead of winter, while spring lies frozen underground, Emmanuel is born, God with us.

Image by Susanne Jutzeler, suju-foto from Pixabay