Friday's Theme: Messengers

​       Even in these first days of December, things are feeling different to me. November brought almost too much to pray over. Emotions ran high, sleep was felt elusive. Everything felt on edge. December brings the opportunity for turning the page – literally and figuratively – and starting anew. For me the familiar carols help. For me, seeing the branches on the trees, bare and vulnerable help.
 
     My soul resonates with trees. Way back in February `Trees’ was the theme for our Women’s church retreat. We spent the weekend learning and reading about, sitting under, hugging, sketching, praying and singing beside trees. Trees are such great life-teachers. One of the messages for me from the weekend was about their cooperation and collaboration with and for one another. We learned about and then saw that trees don’t crash into one another. Over time, months into years they grow close-by one another. Sometimes they weave around one another. They make a way. They share resources and space. Over time they live into ways that speak to yes/and. All around us, these messengers are living out ways for us to learn - there is room enough for all of us.
 
     It seems like a funny request to invite one another to be more vulnerable when we are living in days of wearing masks and social distancing. Something feels very contrary about that. And then I wonder if there ever could be a better time to consider being more vulnerable – with others as well as ourselves. Here in these Pandemic days could there be a better time of risking openness and transparency? Could there be a better time for cooperation and collaboration, like our tree-teachers? These are surely uncharted days for us. These are days that can throw us off at a moment’s notice. And the truth is, these may just be the most precious days of our lives. We are learning by the hour about who we are at our very core. We are learning to reconsider what matters most. Like it or not, we are learning about our great and small vulnerabilities.
 
     This past Sunday I wrote about ways that trees are able to show us their histories in their rings. Now in these early December days the trees around us are teaching us another lesson. These trees of all heights and shapes are showing us what can be seen when their leaves fall away. Appearing to be stripped bare, yet they stand tall. December invites us, using trees as our teachers, to risk a vulnerability of being more fully seen. No longer covered up, their branches reaching up and up, beyond what was before. Perhaps we, too can follow the wisdom of these teachers and risk being seen, if even just a little bit in this Advent season. Maybe we, too can risk being vulnerable in new ways. Maybe we too, will better see and appreciate one another as we grow in far-stretching ways. Maybe we too, can heed their lesson of believing there truly is room enough for all of us. Look around, as far as the eye can see, our messengers are showing us a new way.   ​

​                                                                                                                                                                               Thursday’s Theme: Prayer
 
     Advent is about prayer, just as prayer is about Advent. They weave in and through one another. Advent is the first season of the Christian year. Prayer is the spiritual practice that lives and breathes our faith. It is the season, the practice of slowing down, the season of preparing and the practice of waiting. All in one.
 
     2020’s Advent is happening in the midst of a pandemic. This roller-coaster of feelings and emotions, this avalanche of news, this global tragedy now ordering our days. It is hard not to be swept away in the tsunami that is COVID. Here in the midst of this whirlwind, here - right here - Advent calls for us to pray.
 
     Advent calls for us to slow down. Advent doesn’t tell us to quit or give up. It invites us instead to slow down. Prayer shifts me time and again from what is to what has always been and on to what is to be next. Prayers shifts me from rushing through this hour, from enduring this day to what is surrounding me, holding me in this moment? And time and again just that slowing down shifts my heart and sometimes even my head so that I am renewed – just enough to re-enter.
 
     Prayer is about preparing. Often when I begin my prayer, I am mindful or fearful about what is missing. I’ll confess I’m often that gripey-prayer-person. Not always complaining, but often having a clear expectation of how things are supposed to be. And thank God, prayer is a muscle I know to use to get out of my own way. Advent’s invitation to prepare is not about getting out the tree ornaments and decorating the house. Instead, Advent’s preparation takes place inside of you and me. It is making room for what is better and what is next. It is emptying-out the stories and worries that have taken up space for long enough and serve us no more. Preparing the way will need room and prayerful practice to ready our spirits for what is yet to come.
 
     Advent is the season of waiting. 2020 has taught us so much about waiting. Waiting to know when we go back to school or back to work. Waiting in line to vote and then for news of results. Waiting in line for COVID tests and then waiting for negative or positive news. Standing outside windows trying to create a “regular visit” with loved ones who are at risk by coming too physically close to us. Sitting and waiting at the bedside of loved ones who are dying. In our Advent-waiting, we are invited to follow a star. Maybe better than any other year in our lives, this year we best understand that this Advent’s waiting is happening in the dark.
 
     When asked about Advent, Dietrich Bonhoeffer said, Advent’s celebration is “possible only to those who are troubled in soul, who know themselves to be poor and imperfect, and who look forward to something greater to come." We know a weariness from this year, and our faults and shortcomings have shown themselves time and again. This journeying-to-Bethlehem season, this prayerful anticipation season surrounds us and holds us close now. So, we are invited, nudged, reminded to slow down and to prepare, and to wait. Even if this year we feel especially by ourselves, always, always God is with us in it.   

                                                                                                                                                                    Wednesday’s Theme: Grief
   Every year I have to remind myself that Advent's days are held not in winter but most all of them are held in the fall. Advent is held in nature’s season of holding on and letting go. Advent is seasoned when days grow shorter and nights grow darker. Advent is the time of cold returning and settling in. This past fall in Georgia has felt so much drearier than in previous years. It has felt like the trees sensed our Pandemic-days, and their colors haven’t seemed as bright as past falls have been. There have been some reds and some pretty impressive yellows, but this season has felt more like shades of brown. Some days it has seemed that even the trees were grieving.
 
     Fall is a yearly teacher of letting go. Each year we are gifted with lessons taught leaf-by-leaf. When we are paying attention, we can observe some of life’s lessons being lived out as we watch the leaves falling. We can see them dropping from their branches – sometimes one-by-one, sometimes in a rush, sometimes as if time were standing still. It wasn’t that long ago that we looked out and saw full, green trees. On this chilly Georgia morning, my bones know that we have moved from one season to the next. Autumn invites us to look closer. Autumn invites us into the preciousness of particularity. Each leaf’s release can be a teacher. When we are paying attention, we are invited to witness letting go’s lessons.
 
     Many of us are grieving this Advent. I would venture to say all of us are, but I don't want to put anything on anyone else that doesn’t feel true. For my family, this year has held a funeral in January for a husband/father/grandfather/brother/uncle. Many of us were in Illinois to be together. It has held another funeral for a husband/father/grandfather/uncle this past September that needed to be livestreamed on Facebook. Our family has missed both a high school and college graduation; we missed birthdays and so many other gatherings. 2020 has held and not held more than enough to break this writer's heart more than once.
 
     The season of Advent will be one of our final guides as we navigate these last days of 2020. What will be our mile markers? What tools are we to be given to mark this journey? In Advent we are invited to wait and to watch. These are not “go to sleep and I'll wake you when it's all over” instructions. Instead, these words ask us to push on and push through. Advent’s waiting is the kind of waiting when it's all dark around you and you are praying that the sun will rise one more time. Advent's waiting is the time between the procedure at the doctor's office and the doctor's return phone call. Advent's waiting is the waiting that somehow feels like an eternity between a loved one's dying breaths. Advent’s waiting holds “not yet.” These are our guides for this November into December season.
 
     Even on these colder, darker December days, there are a few leaves yet to fall. Fewer than back in October, that's for sure. I am trying to not miss these teachers around me. It matters to me to mark each moment. It matters to witness each moving from what had been life to what is to be next. And what will be next? “Not yet.” Holding on and letting go in these days invite us to keep paying attention. We are invited to wait and watch.
 
 

                                                                                                                                   Monday's Theme: Relying on the Moon
 
      Tonight, will be a Full Moon. It comes ‘round every twenty-nine days to remind us that impossible is somehow possible. One night each month the Bella Luna brings light to darkness. One night each month we are given new eyes to see.
 
     More than any other year in my lifetime, 2020 has turned so many of us upside-down and inside-out. More than any other time so many of our darkest corners can now be seen in startling and disorienting ways. Light has shown on the disparities of wealth and access. Light has shown on our national schism of politics. It has shown on the deep and wide injustices of racism. With each COVID diagnosis, we should pause and take care – of the one diagnosed and those around that person. Even more so, with each death resulting from COVID, we should stop and recognize and properly grieve – for the one who has died and those who mourn. This stopping. This honoring. This treasuring of each life is who we are. It’s what we do. But it feels impossible to stop or even pause this year. It’s all too much, far too much. It’s happening so fast, and there is so much piling on. The darkness of 2020 feels like it is coming from the inside-out.
 
     Over the years I have come to rely on the moon. There is a sure and steadiness about it. There is a comfort and reassurance, a “hold on `cause something is holding onto you,” about me and the moon. In this year of up being down and down being up, the living of our days just sometimes feels impossible. The making of our way in and through, just feels impossible. Even the getting out of bed in the morning can sometimes feel impossible. And yet and always the moon is there. The moon shows up. Each night. Not at the same time, or even in the same place. But it is there. Sometimes I have to wait for it, sometimes I have to look for it. Sometimes on cloudy nights I just have to trust that it is there -- and miracle of miracles -- it is. And has been there all along. 
 
     In our fits and starts, in our not yet’s, in all of our impossibilities of this particular Advent, we are somehow managing to see in the dark. Carrie Newcomer, poet-singer says it pretty well: “Impossible just takes a little more time.” This full moon night early in this season of waiting, is already reminding us that light does come – just when we need it the most. We just have to believe we can see.
 
 

 
     It was four weeks ago tonight that many of us watched the results of our Election. Younger sister, Betsey and her wife, Mary Ellen invited my older sister, Claudia and me to come over and watch. As the night went on, I further invited myself to spend the night on their couch, with the premonition that it would be a long night. As we gathered around the TV there were four dogs and four humans. "Good balance" I thought as I petted one of the dogs. I remember feeling hopeful.
 
     When midnight rolled around and with it a growing dread of not knowing, Claud and her dog, Lucy said their good-byes and headed home. Soon my hosts and their pooches also headed on to bed. I stayed up for a while. At some point I drifted off but was back awake from 3:00 on until it was time to head on to work early Wednesday morning.
 
      I remember feeling like I was keeping vigil all night. I’ve done that before with both parents in their last hours and have sat with some dear friends and a few others in their last hours. Time is different when you sit vigil. In those minutes into hours, it’s as though you are living in the past, present and future with almost each breath. Time is different. As I felt I was sitting vigil on that Tuesday night, I remember one question circling round and round, over and over again in my head: “Who are we now?”
 
      There was a time in our country’s history when folks literally had to `circle the wagons’ in order to survive. They believed they were in mortal danger. Shoulder to shoulder, they fought like their lives depended on it. THEM against US. “You’ll have to pry this gun out of my cold, dead hands…”
 
    And as I watched the results and news about absentee ballots being recorded in AZ and GA, in NC and WI that image of a long-ago desperation returned. Have we come to this place? Is it now our intent that communities are on one side of the fence or the other? Are our borders drawn around those who only think like us? Look like us? Love like us? Worship like us? Are we now living again in a time of circling the wagons? Are we most concerned with building the walls higher and better than ever before.?
 
     Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. spoke to us of the Beloved Community. At the King Center here in Atlanta we are told: “Dr. King’s Beloved Community is a global vision in which all people can share in the wealth of the earth. In the Beloved Community, poverty, hunger and homelessness will not be tolerated because international standards of human decency will not allow it. Racism and all forms of discrimination, bigotry and prejudice will be replaced by an all-inclusive spirit of sisterhood and brotherhood.” 
 
     There is a story of a woman asking her teacher about the difference between heaven and hell. In the story the woman found herself transported to a great banquet hall with tables of all sizes, shapes and hues. She saw rows of people as far as she could see. She was overpowered by the noise and the chaos of the room. As she looked closer, she could see that tables were lined with an incredible array of foods from everywhere, bowls overflowing. “With all of this bounty, why is there so much chaos?” she wondered aloud. And then she began to see everything. She saw that everyone at the table had the longest spoons she’d ever seen tied to their arms. The ends affixed at their shoulders and extended all the way down past both hands. She realized that no one could bend their elbows. As she watched she saw the frustration and anger on their faces, and for the first time, she saw how thin everyone was. And in a blink of an eye the woman was transported again. At first, she thought she was in the same room, but this one was softer and quieter. She could hear laughter and people telling stories back and forth. As she looked, she saw the same long banquet tables, with the most delicious food. All the THINGS were the same. “What makes this so different?” Later when she told her story to all who would listen, the woman would say, “I felt what the difference was before I saw it.” All the people had the same long spoons tied to their arms, but the difference was – everyone was feeding another person. Down the long rows, she witnessed laughter and tears of deep knowing, `There was more than enough.’ For everyone.
 
     When I think about the Beloved Community it begins with this story. We know well the despair, chaos and poverty of the first room. We have seen much of it our whole lives. 2020 has been the strictest teacher of my lifetime. The lessons feel as though they have almost been beaten into us. “Me and Mine” has been the banner flying high. “Build our borders higher and wider!” our motto. One-by-one the souls in the second banquet hall stopped. One-by-one they saw (perhaps for the first time) that the one across from them was starving to death, and there was so much food. One-by-one they began to feed the other. And that changed everything. 
 
 

                                                                                                                                                         Sunday's Theme: Time

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       “It’s surely been a year.”  Enough said. Well, that is awkward if these are the first lines of this year’s Advent blog. But no kidding - what a year. One surely to remember. One surely many of us wish to forget.
   
       Our struggles are global and national and personal. A deadly Pandemic has riddled our bodies and our spirits. This Pandemic has taken away graduations and celebrations from our children. It has taken visits away from our older ones. It has robbed all of us of hugs. The violence in our country against people of color has bubbled over and brought us to the streets and to our knees. Many endured more hurricanes than we had letters in the alphabet. We have been met with words that have wounded and words that have offered hope. With kindnesses that have bubbled up there has been so much destruction and pain. Courageous and strong leaders have died in recent months who held the candle out to show us the way in our darkness. It will take the lot of us to fill their shoes. The election that brought hope again for many, but not for some. It has surely been a year.
   
       Today we begin Advent. Today we set out on a four-week journey that leads us to Bethlehem. Today we are offered the opportunity to step off life’s merry-go-round and follow a star. Today we are invited to reflect on all that has engulfed us, we are welcomed into intentional days to choose to slow down and let our hearts catch up.
   
       When I find myself overwhelmed with all the things I don't know- which is certainly this year -- I try to remind myself of what I do know. As I reflect on 2020, I take comfort in the lessons we are given each day from trees. They are daily growing, stretching, persisting all around us. For all our days they stand as our teachers ready to remind us of truths always deeply rooted. Trees mark their time on earth with rings that round the circumference within their trunks. Each year holds a dark and light ring side-by-side. This pair can tell you if there has been a fire. The rings tell us if there’s been too much or too little rain. Each tree balances time within time. Hard times and wonderful, blessed times. Years captured side-by-side telling the life story of each tree. Light and dark paired to measure time and history. These teachers standing all around us remind us of a greater picture than just this moment. All these moments are our story. Times of fire and drought alongside times of abundance. All of it held together in the life of each tree. As it is with us, each of us hold time within time.
   
       We set our hearts today to Bethlehem. 2020 has been a year with far too much and not nearly enough. One year in my life and in yours. Poet, Emily Saliers would remind us that “we are better off for all that we let in,” and I believe she is so very right about this year. We are here in this place, in these days. In this coming season, we are invited to lean into something bigger and brighter, something deeper and richer, something as familiar as a favorite song and as close as our next breath. As we set out toward Bethlehem, we are invited to remember all along the way what has been true our whole lives – Emmanuel, God is with us.  
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       
   
  
  

     Tomorrow the season of Advent begins. This longtime tradition in the Christian community invites followers to slow down, to prepare for something new, to wait.
                 Slowing Down and
                        Preparing for something new and
                               Waiting.
Each one feels important. Each one feels needed. Each one of these feels both impossible and just in time for me for these days.
 
     For the past several years, I’ve been writing a daily blog for the days of Advent. Beginning tomorrow, you are invited to companion me on this year’s Advent journey to Bethlehem. With these daily reflections, I hope to offer a space and place for you to slow down, to prepare and to help create space for waiting. As November comes to a close and we enter into 2020’s final month, I invite you to reflect on what was and is and to pray for what is yet to be. Advent each year calls us to jump off life’s merry-go-round and journey on a path of renewal and promise.
 
     Over lunch one Saturday a couple weeks ago, son Sam helped me choose 7 themes to companion us from November in and through December. On Sundays exploring one theme, on Monday another and moving on through the week, through the season. If this Advent blog had a table of contents, it would look like this:
             Sundays:          Time
             Mondays:        Relying on the Moon
             Tuesdays:        Cornerstone Words of Faith
             Wednesdays:  Grief
             Thursday:       Prayers
              Fridays:            Messengers
             Saturdays:       (De) Light
 
     It felt good to talk with Sam about writing these blogs. I was grateful for his kind listening and for his help in musing them into beginning. 2020 has been a year like no other, and it’s helpful for me to stop and let my heart catch up. As Sam and I talked I was reminded, yet again that words help me, help us begin to make sense of troubling times. Words can help us build bridges toward one another, open doors and let another in.
 
     For the next twenty-seven days many believers and dreamers and questioners will be turning their hearts to Bethlehem. Especially this year, I am seeking a bright star to lead me. Especially this year, I am trying to see in the dark. Especially this year, I am listening for the carols that somehow can bring me home. O Come, O Come Emmanuel. 
 
(thank you, Claudia for this candle)
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