Advent 2009, Week 1

• She openeth her mouth with wisdom...

Advent has kind of eluded me the last few years; it almost snuck past me again, but I think I actually caught up with it this year

I wasn't raised with a tradition of observing Advent. It wasn't a tradition in my family, and the churches I attended, when I did attend, were not "Advent observant" if there is such a description. We celebrated Christmas and Easter in as much of a "non-secular" way as each congregation or individual family thought best. Although I had friends who attended more liturgical churches, the ceremony and formality seemed foreign to my experience. Fast forward to several years ago, when I was looking for ways to "celebrate the season" in a way that was more spiritually meaningful to me, without completely doing away with the traditions of Christmas that I'd grown up with that held their own place in my heart.

In a nutshell, Advent is celebrated, or observed, on each of the four Sundays leading up to Christmas, and Christmas Eve. Some years it all falls in December; some years, as it does this year, the first Sunday of Advent falls in November. The word "advent" simply means "coming" or "visitation". Just as Christmas is meant to be the celebration of the first advent, or coming, of Christ, the Messiah, the season of Advent is meant to remember the time leading up to the first advent, and to anticipate and prepare our hearts for the second advent yet to come.

There is no one right way to do Advent, any more than there's one right way to do Christmas or any other holiday. It generally involves a wreath with four candles, one to be lit for each of the four Sundays during the season, and often a fifth candle in the middle for Christmas Eve. Some traditions have all white candles, some have three purple candles and one pink candle, and one white candle. The years I did Advent, I made my own wreath, and used four different colored candles to represent different aspects of Christ--purple for His Kingship, blue for His Priesthood, red for His blood sacrifice, and white for His purity and holiness.

For more on the origins of Advent and ways to observe, from another who came to Advent observation later in life, read this excellent series of posts by Mark Roberts.

I don't do a formal observation of Advent every year, but taking the time to focus on the Advent season helps me to take a step back from the frenzy of busy-ness that tends to overwhelm us at this time of year, and to refocus on the spiritual meaning that should be behind it all.

I'll be sharing a little more about my personal thoughts and observations of advent later, but for now, let me leave you with these scriptures, from the 40th chapter of Isaiah:

• The voice of one crying in the wilderness: "Prepare the way of the Lord; Make straight in the desert a highway for our God.
• Every valley shall be exalted and every mountain and hill brought low; the crooked places shall be made straight and the rough places smooth
• The glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together; For the mouth of the Lord has spoken."

In this Advent season, I intend to take some time to prepare my heart for the way of the Lord.

Until next time...