End And Begin At Rest

Good morning…

Last Wednesday, we ended our class for the young moms at Northside Church with a simple, low-key, makeshift party. Pretzels and pistachios. Carrots and spicy almond Bitchin’ Sauce. Apple cider, seltzer waters and gooey homemade brownies. Easy, honest conversation rounded out our bonding semester, as we sat on the floor, picnic style, in the children’s wing of our church. “You looked so relaxed,” one woman said. “I just had to take your picture.”

We ended our meaningful semester before the season of Advent began.

Yesterday, over the phone, my friend said beautiful things about Advent, wise insights I jotted in my journal.

“We sit here together on this the first Sunday in Advent,” she said. “Longing and waiting. Expectation and hope. We are stepping into whatever God has for us this year and the years ahead. We simply take one confident step at a time, knowing that God is right here, always.”

“We sit still here on the first day of the liturgical year, surrounded by the liminal space of what has been and what is not yet,” she continued. “It’s like each Advent we get a do-over, we’re given a whole new space to enter with God, a wide-open calendar ahead.”

“While the world can get swept up in crowded consumerism,” she concluded, “we are at rest with God, and others are drawn into that peaceful energy. We don’t have to orchestrate anything. Our single task is to come to rest in our body, in our home, in our world. From our place of rest, God becomes the magnet. We plug into our source of peace, continually recharging our battery. Any gift given is not our doing. We are only witnesses to the outpouring of God.”

Sit here. Take one confident step at a time. Know God is right here, always. As we enter this season of Advent, God orchestrates everything from our place of rest, and others are drawn into that peaceful energy. Every good gift and every perfect (free, large, full) gift is from above; it comes down from the Father of all [that gives] light (James 1:17a, AMPC).

…Sue…