This year, I was grateful to be invited to contribute to Belmont’s Advent Devotional Guide. I already skipped ahead to all the entries from my favorite theology professors, and it was so comforting to hear their distinct, formative voices in my head as I read. Seeing as the season of Advent is already upon us, I’d like to offer my reflection here for you. If you’d like to see the whole Advent guide with a devotion for each day, click here.
Readings:
Psalms 40, 51, 54
Isaiah 10:5-19
Matthew 11:2-15
2 Peter 2:17-22
Why is it that the season of Advent—a time of hope, celebration, and the warmth of shared humanity—takes place during winter, a season of bare branches and relentless cold? Parker Palmer observes that “Despite appearances, nature isn’t dead: it has gone underground to renew and prepare for spring . . . Winter clears the landscape, however brutally, giving us a chance to see reality more clearly, to reclaim the true ground of our being.” Scripture and history attest to God’s endless appetite for subverting and re-calibrating our hope, and in the Advent story, this recalibration takes us deep beneath the surface of our lives.
Robert Macfarlane writes that “humans are subterranean-impaired creatures,” uniquely challenged at perceiving the growth and renewal that occurs under our feet. We’d rather revel in the above-ground feast of summer, staking our lives on outward signs of growth, than trust in the dormancy of a bare forest. Today’s scripture readings are riddled with cautions against these outward signs. The psalmist repeats again and again that God does not desire burnt offerings and sacrifices—outward signs of piety and devotion—but “a broken and contrite heart” (Ps. 51:17). Jesus mocks the crowd’s preoccupation with outward signs as he asks, “What then did you go out to see? Someone dressed in soft robes?” (Matt. 11:8) In each case, we are instructed to walk resolutely past vain spectacle in search of the precious, hidden promises of God.
After all, in those rare cases when I obtain the feast of summer—The Thing I Thought I Wanted—I’m often disappointed. As I grasp the “answer” with all my strength, I know deep down that this glass of water was given to me not to quench all thirst, but to introduce me to yet a deeper thirst. It is with this spirit of humility and deepened desire that the story of Christ’s incarnation unfolds: not with summer’s grandiosity or spring’s eagerness, but with an ear to the frozen ground of winter, whispering, “Did you hear that? Something’s shifting beneath the surface.”
I’ll be back next month with some more thoughts to share. Until then, stay safe and stay well.
-Drew
Love it, bro.
Thanks for sharing this with us, Drew! I’m late to this post, but really thankful to have it to savor through this final week of Advent.