Waiting, Preparation, Peace
A playing card with a family activity for Advent reads:
Advent is a time of waiting. Waiting can be hard, but it can also help us pay attention in important ways. Talk together about how you will wait this season. Could you set up your nativity but not add baby Jesus until Christmas Eve? Could you wait to make a favorite Christmas cookie, to watch a beloved Christmas movie, or to sing a favorite Christmas carol?
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This week finds the Edison-Albright family In full transition mode: preparing for and moving to our new home in Appleton. “People Look East,” one of my favorite Advent hymns, has very different resonance this year. I’m not going to lie: being surrounded by boxes and giant, rolling dust bunnies has made me think about the “make your house fair as you are able” line and cringe a little. Love is still on the way, even if my table is not set or your hearth is not lit. This is most certainly true, and just as true is that Love is with us in the truth and reality of difficult seasons in our lives, in the church, and in the world.
Every year, my family uses the “Families Celebrate Advent and Christmas” cards from 1517 Media to guide us through the seasons. One recent card helped us talk as a family about waiting. It asks “what could you wait for this year?” — in our case, it gave us a chance to name out loud some of the things we were starting to silently miss because of the move and the pandemic. Saying it out loud, within the framework of Advent waiting, was good and holy and hard and helpful. I’ve included the image of the card and the text of it in the image caption, and encourage you to use or adapt the idea for a devotion for yourself, with your friends and family, or with leaders in your ministry context. It helps to name out loud what we are waiting for, this Advent, this year: “We are waiting to gather together in person again.” “We are waiting to sing together.” “We are waiting to travel to see our extended family members … and that is so important and so hard.”
In the midst of moving, I am reflecting on the faithful waiting and witness of Anna and Simeon and preparing to preach for synod-wide worship on Dec. 27. I’ve been thinking about how Simeon’s song–the nunc dimitis that is sung at compline, the last prayer before going to bed at night–reveals so much about both God’s peace, and how we can experience the gift of God’s peace revealed in our relationships with and interaction with elders. Prophets warn throughout scripture that the world’s peace is often superficial and untrustworthy: we should be wary of people who say “peace” where there is no peace or of authoritarian attempts to impose oppression under the guise of peace. God’s peace is different; God’s deep peace liberates.
Do you have a story of how God’s peace was revealed to you through interaction with an elder? Please share it with me in the comments! I will draw on these stories as I prepare for my sermon, either for background reflection or as examples in the sermon itself, so share stories you wouldn’t mind being shared and help me out with your full name, ministry context/congregation and what your role is, there. Thank you for your help–it is good to be in ministry and community together.
In a couple days the boxes will be on the truck and Sean–my spouse–and I will tackle the dust bunnies. The place that’s been our home in Iowa will feel dark and very empty; there will be a sense of sadness and loss. Lovingly cleaning this house and making room for a new family to move in and make this house their home is making room for Christ. It is preparing the way. In the midst of your preparations, a blessing: Love is on the way; Love knows all the losses and griefs you can name, and the ones you keep only in your heart; Love arrives with deep, liberating peace; Love abides with you no matter what. Amen.
Bishop Anne Edison-Albright (she/her)
East Central Synod of Wisconsin
bishop@ecsw.org
