For the first week of Advent … WAIT AND WATCH!

So often we too need to slow down and listen to the Lord, to sit at his feet for a while, even if it is just for five minutes a day!

Editor’s note: This year, Advent starts Dec. 3, so after Thanksgiving, you can prepare for the season with the first in a series of reflections that were first published in The Evangelist in 2018.

We are about to begin our short season of Advent, as we prepare for the advent or the coming of our Lord. Incidentally, this year our season is as short as it can be. It is barely three weeks long, as the Fourth Sunday of Advent is actually Christmas Eve! In our season we prepare, of course, for Jesus’ coming to us at Christmas; what is usually called the first coming of Christ. We can also think of His final coming at the end of time or, as we say in the Creed at Mass, “He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead.” In fact, our liturgical season of Advent reflects this sense of a two-fold coming of Jesus. For the first few weeks of Advent, we are invited to focus on the second coming of Jesus Christ at the end of time and what this means for us here and now. Only as we get close to Christmas do we then really turn our attention to his first coming at Christmas, especially as we enter the last week of Advent from Dec. 17 onwards.

Many spiritual writers such as St. Bernard, also reflect that in between the Lord’s first coming at Christmas and last coming at the end of time, there is something of a “third coming.” Jesus, in fact, comes to us in many ways every day: in prayer, in people and events, in the Sacred Scriptures and, of course, in the Eucharist. We can think especially of how our Lord comes to us in the sick and the needy. This ties in perfectly with the Gospel we have for the Feast of Christ, the King (Matthew 25:31-46). We heard the question: “Lord, when did we see you …?” Then we heard our Lord’s reply: “In as much as you did it for the least of these, you did it to me.” Advent, then, is very much a time when we focus both on Jesus’ coming to us in all these many ways and on His presence among us at every time and in every moment of our lives.

Advent is also very much like a journey and, like any good journey, we not only have a destination in mind (the coming of Jesus), but also we use a map (or even a GPS!) to get there. Advent does indeed follow a route or a plan and it has a structure for each Sunday, so as to help us to journey well. Each Sunday then is like a milepost, or a road sign, on that journey; pointing us in the right direction, as we prepare for the coming of the Lord

The theme or milepost for the first Sunday of Advent is to watch and wait for the Lord. For many of us, it is a timely reminder that as Christians, we need to be like Mary as well as Martha in the Gospels (cf. Luke 10:38-42). Martha was so busy with things that she did not have time to listen to Jesus, whereas Mary sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to him. So often we too need to slow down and listen to the Lord, to sit at his feet for a while, even if it is just for five minutes a day! We may feel that we are too busy to pray, especially at this frantic time of the year with all those preparations and activities. It is worth remembering what Saint Mother Teresa of Kolkata often said: “If I am really busy then I need to pray twice as hard … and twice as long!”

There is also a danger that we feel watching and waiting is somehow wasting time and energy. It goes against the grain to watch and to wait. We get frustrated when a traffic light turns red, and the yellow light is seen as an invitation to put the foot down hard on the accelerator, rather than to slow down! We get impatient waiting in line at a store; after all, we have a long list of errands to run and time is money. Then there are all those instant makeover programs on the TV. Results are needed right now or even yesterday! Watching and waiting may not be among our strong points. Yet, watching and waiting on the Lord will not be time wasted. Furthermore, some things just cannot and should not be hurried; time is essential for a true spiritual maturing and revealing to take place. In fact, watching and waiting is necessary, and even vital, for our spiritual growth. As St. John Chrysostom observed many centuries ago: “We are not simply to believe, but to watch; not simply to love, but to watch; not simply to obey, but to watch … true Christians, whoever they are, watch … and inconsistent Christians do not.”

This then is our theme for the first week of Advent. Looking ahead through our Advent season, in the second week, we will think again of Saint John the Baptist and his mission to prepare a way for the Lord. John decreased as the Lord increased. We are called to do the same; that is to let the Lord grow in our life. Our third week places before us that great and important attitude of joy: we rejoice for the Lord is coming, he is near to us. We recall that this joy is not something superficial, or as Bernard Bassett called it “contingent;” that is depending only on things going well, or depending on others, or even the situation in our world. Rather, it is a gift and also an inner peace and strength that is there, regardless of life and its ups and downs. In our fourth and final week, we celebrate the annunciation of the good news that God is indeed with us. This is true not just at Christmas, but for every moment of our life.

This time of year is so very busy at school, at home and at work and all those shopping days until Christmas are disappearing rapidly! The Church wisely gives us this special season of Advent to help us in all this busyness to prepare for the coming of our Savior, Jesus Christ. So, let us use this time well, let us journey through Advent well and let us prepare well; so that as the Lord comes to us, we may have hearts and minds open and ready to welcome him. Let us echo the final words of the last book in the New Testament: “Maranatha, Come, Lord Jesus!”

Father Anthony Barratt is the director of the Office of Prayer and Worship, episcopal vicar for the Hudson Valley Vicariate, a member of the Presbyteral Council & College of Consultors and pastor at Holy Trinity Parish in Hudson-Germantown — all for the Diocese of Albany — and adjunct professor at Siena College and St. Bernard’s Postgraduate School of Theology and Ministry in Albany.