To prepare is to harness that usually unlikeable practice of waiting, for you don’t need to prepare for something already here. Preparing leaves in its essence the unknown. To prepare is to be in the darkness before the light is switched on. Preparing is filling your oil lamps and keeping them filled. To prepare for a future hope is to trust. You may not know when or how exactly it will happen, but you trust that which you are preparing for will come. Trusting leads to faith-faith in what you may not be able to see.
We have but faith: we cannot know;
For knowledge is of things we see
And yet we trust it comes from thee,
A beam in darkness: let it grow.
(Alfred Lord Tennyson)
Advent is a season of waiting. The Latin “veni” in Advent speaks of ‘coming’, which invokes an invitation to prepare and then wait in an eager expectation of the coming. For Advent, imagine yourself in the unknown pre-Christ’s birth time of history when the people of the world were in a darkness because the Ancient of Days was coming, but had not yet come. They could not see. That which was ‘yet-to-come’ was left to images and metaphors, the only way was to imagine in ways humans can. The O Antiphons are prayers/poems that lead us up to Christmas, each one describing Christ from ancient days without ever naming Him. They call Him by other names in their expectations and understanding of Him being all these things. These are poems of anticipation, of waiting for the promise to be fulfilled. They are prayers of hope and longing at the same time. The names of each one:
-Sapientia (wisdom)
-Adonai (Lord)
-Radix Jesse (root of Jesse)
-Clavis David (key of David)
-Oriens (dayspring)
-Rex Gentium (king of nations)
-O Emmanuel (God with us)
In the spirit of preparing I read poems. Poems that cause me to pause. Words that squeeze so much meaning into very few lines. Poems that encourage imaginatively living before Christ’s birth to better understand the Advent hope. The Advent miracle of Love-the freely given Love that came down to meet us where we are. Poems allow a hidden divine presence to dance in light between the words and carefully coined phrases.
Poems invite us to dive into their words and images, in anticipation of what is to come–
If thy first glance so powerful be,
A mirth but open’d and seal’d up again;
What wonders shall we feel, when we shall see
Thy full-ey’d love!
When thou shalt look us out of pain,
And one aspect of thine spend in delight
More than a thousand suns disburse in light,
In heaven above.
(George Herbert)
The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness-on them light has shined. (Isaiah 9:2)
Lord, You are our Lord, You are wisdom, the root, the key, the day spring, the king of all nations, and You are with us. May we seek You in all our preparation and through any darkness that surrounds us. May we pause with poetic words that draw us closer to You. To seek You always, in all things. Amen. (Written for my church's Advent Devo this year)
No comments:
Post a Comment