The Practice of Yearning

Wednesday of the First Week of Advent

O God, you are my God; eagerly I seek you; 

my soul thirsts for you, my flesh faints for you,

as in a barren and dry land where there is no water.

Psalm 63:1

I wake to frost covering the yard, the cold of the season having finally arrived. The dusting of white is its own kind of barrenness, signaling, among other things, the need to bundle up before venturing outside.

Bundling up is also good preparation before venturing fully into the season of Advent. I want to wrap myself in comfy reflections and warm traditions to ward off the chill of a world which is not at all interested in the sweetness of newborn salvation. I want to hold my hope close to the warmth of my heartbeat and protect myself from cold indifference and the cruelty that seems to creep into daily life.

And so I remind myself that eagerly seeking God and yearning for the mystery of the incarnation are the practices that will sustain me. For now, they are enough.

Refuge

Tuesday of the First Week of Advent

But all who take refuge in you will be glad;

they will sing out their joy for ever. Psalm 5:13

We walk in the brisk cold, our bodies warming with the steady movement. The landscape of the trail is familiar, but not completely known, and we pause at each junction to discuss the way forward.

I soon become aware that the picture I have in my mind of the twists and turns of this path is faulty. The trail coils right and up when I expect it to curve left and down. And just how many times does it cross and recross the stream?

Yet even while I seem to have lost all sense of direction, I know where I am. The trail itself is a refuge, the stream singing glad psalms to the Holy One, the bare trees raising limbs in homage. I am safe in God’s sanctuary.

We reach the bottommost section of this trail and I pause in awe at the formation of icicles along an overhang, brilliantly protecting whatever lies within that mystical space. A refuge within a refuge. I know I stand on holy ground.

Wanted: A Shield

But you, O Lord, are a shield about me;

you are my glory, the one who lifts up my head.

Psalm 3:3

Advent has just begun and already I need to shield myself from the assaults of a world that is not at all headed toward the manger. Where is the tenderness I expect from a world of God's making? Is my confidence in the practice of hopefulness a fool's naiveté?

In worship yesterday, I entered this season of expectation in community. We lit the first candle. We prayed to cast away the works of darkness. We sang for love, the guest on the way. A child eagerly gathered up the materials to make her own advent wreath at home. A couple asked for a blessing of their 51 years of marriage. An elder warmly greeted the parents whose infant daughter will soon be baptized.

And I realize, once again, that it is God who shields me. The Holy One transforms this community into a sacrament and once more the ancient traditions feed and heal and nurture. I step out on the road in good company, and God lifts my face toward Bethlehem.