Turn - December 10, 2018

"Turn to Me and be saved, all the ends of the earth; For I am God, and there is no other.”

Isaiah 45:22

Another advent is well underway. Our annual reminder that once again it is our turn to wait. Of course all through the year we wait on many things. We wait for buses. We wait for news to arrive by any number of different means of communication. We wait for someone to do something for us or evaluate us in some way. We wait for medical results, for the work day to be done, or school to be over. I think it’s safe to say that each day, at least once, we find that it is our turn to wait for something.

But Advent is different. It is during this wondrous season, while we wait our turn to celebrate the joyous birth of the Christ Child, that we are afforded the precious opportunity, if we are willing to take advantage of it, to reflect on the magnitude of the event for which we all are waiting.

I believe that the season of Advent is an invitation to all of us to turn away from the chaos swirling around us at every turn and make the most important turn of all. The turn that we are all called to make. The turn for which we were all created by God our Father. Simply put, we must turn back toward Him. Advent represents an extraordinary gift which enables us to remember that if we refocus our efforts and intentionally turn back toward Christ we will be better able to live more fully into the role of apostles that we were meant to fulfill.

There is perhaps no better place to start living into this invitation than Advent as we wait expectantly for that moment in the manager when the wait was finally over and the world can turn, along with Mary and Joseph, to face the challenges ahead with the confidence and strength afforded to each of us by the birth of Christ. It will be there, cradled in the loving comfort of the palm of God’s hand, that we will never again feel the need to turn away from anything because we will have everything that we need.

It’s our turn. It’s the world’s turn. And no matter how often we may veer off course or how many wrong turns we may make we must now dedicate ourselves to making that last turn and knowing that we are almost home. My prayer for all of us this season is that we will remember the gift that Advent provides and do everything in our power to right the ship, re-calibrate our compasses, and turn back toward the light of Christ.

We have a bit more waiting to do this year. And while we wait, there is work to be done.

Peace to all.

Post by Michael Southwick

We are listening

View image | gettyimages.com

November 29, 2015 
Reflection by Tuesday Rupp

Have you ever noticed that so many of the texts for Advent involve proclamations? Prophetic words are fashioned into hymns: “Comfort, comfort ye my people/speak ye peace/thus saith our God,” or “On Jordan’s Bank the Baptist’s cry/announces that the Lord is nigh.” One of my favorite parts of Handels Messiah is the soprano singing the part of the Angel: “For Behold! I bring you glad tidings of great joy!” It makes sense to me that we delight in singing along in hymns, carols, at choral concerts or in the car with the radio.

Music has a way of ordering time with rhythm. Sometimes when singing in church, or playing an instrument, or even listening to an album, time has a way of standing still. Similarly, our liturgical calendar sets a rhythm to the earth-turning duration of a year, a compound rhythm against all the other calendars.

During Advent, the invitation from text and tradition is to relax the tempo. Both prophetic proclamations and angelic announcements ask the same thing of the hearer: listen. The Creator of the stars of night comes close to speak a word or two. This is hard: the other calendars are ramping up to the too-fast dance of all of the expectations of this cultural season. Many of us look longingly at quiet day offerings and centering prayer groups, despairing of finding time to quiet our hearts so we can hear.

This Advent, we are offering 24 mini-retreats, using images, music, and short reflections for the day and the season. They will be posted on this blog daily, available by email if you wish. With each day’s offering, we invite you to notice your breathing, to notice your being, and to spend a few minutes present to this precious time when God is coming ever closer. “Give us eyes to see - give us ears to hear - that your Word is come - that your Word is here.”

May we all listen better this Advent season.