I love the season of Advent. I refuse to do anything, hear anything, or taste anything even remotely Christmas-related until after Thanksgiving, but once December 1st hits, I am all in. I love the sights, smells, sounds of this season. Perhaps most of all, I love the fact that it is easier for me to devote myself to reading Scripture during this time of year than it is at any other time. There really isn't anything else like it in the secular or the church calendar. Advent is a time of waiting with hopeful expectation of joy. I'm betting that's how we're supposed to live all the time, waiting for the return of Christ. But I fail at that on a colossal scale, except during December, when the world cooperates. Even the tackiest, most tawdry decoration that the consumer-focused world around me coughs up reminds me that Christmas is coming. And by God's grace, I think of my joy in Jesus.
Advent is especially precious to me this year. I am eagerly anticipating the celebration of Christ's first coming, but I am also eagerly (and, it has to be said, impatiently) anticipating the coming of my children through adoption out of the foster care system (if God wills). It has been hard to wait. I'm not very good at waiting; I've never met anyone who is. It is even harder to wait not knowing where my boys are, if they are in a loving and familiar foster home or in a shelter, if they are happy and hopeful or despondent and despairing.
One of the best sermons I've ever heard was from Ben Stuart, who preached at a youth camp on "the fullness of time" from Galatians 4:4. He explained why Jesus coming exactly when He did was ideal and made sense. You can listen to a version of that sermon here. It is the October 25th sermon, titled (appropriately enough) “Adopted.” I encourage you to give it a listen.
It must have been hard for God to wait. To wait while His people were enslaved in Egypt for 400 years, crying out to Him for deliverance. To wait while they stumbled and sinned on an increasingly repulsive scale during the divided kingdom and the prophets. To wait while they grew in repentance in Babylon and longed for Jerusalem. To wait in silence as He moved the world toward a common language, safe roads, and a time of peace. (the clip Ben references on this can be found here)
It must have been excruciating for Jesus to wait. From birth til age 30, Jesus walked this earth seeing the pain and misery all around Him and knowing that He could help. Yet He waited until the time God had appointed for His ministry to begin. We often think of the unendurable pain of the last week of His life, but I think the days before He began His ministry must have been torture. To see the disease, carry the cure, and not reach out to save the desperate and dying must have been an unimaginable burden. Yet it shows the depth of His trust in the will and timing of God.
I struggle with this trust. I know I should trust God; I work and pray each day to trust Him more. Yet I itch with impatience. I fume with it. There are some days when I can hardly stand it, knowing I am so close to bringing these boys home and yet so far. Knowing that they have spent years waiting for a family, my heart breaks for every minute they continue on this earth without a mom. It's hard.
But Advent helps. Each year, the Dallas Theological Seminary puts together a devotional guide for Advent. Every day has a passage of Scripture and a short essay written by a DTS professor. For the past two years, it has been my dearest treasure. I thought that I would miss it this year, as I am not physically on campus. Silly me! The guide is posted online here. This year, the theme is the names of Jesus. Oh, it is so good! I have always found that the one thing that drives away worry and anxiety in my life is not prayer but worship. Focusing on the attributes of God during this time is sweet balm to my soul. I am nervous, impatient, frustrated, bound up with worry and waiting. God is all-powerful, all-present, all-perfect. With a giant sigh of relief, I can rest in that.
I pray that you will too.
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