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“Every valley shall be filled, and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked shall be make straight, and the rough ways made smooth;” – Luke 3:5

Our theme for Advent is the Spanish word Esperar. Esperar is to hope in something to happen and have some reason to expect it will happen as we wait. What a perfect word for this time of year. It seems that we have been in an Advent Season for a long time with Covid still lurking around. We are more than ready to be done with this pandemic! I was talking with a neighbor the other day and she said, “I am so sick of it! I can’t stand wearing masks anymore and I just want it to be done! But as hard as it is, we are trying in our family to patiently wait for it to be over and hope we will be done soon.” 

Sounds like Advent to me. We are in a waiting season which makes Advent hit even closer to home. As frustrating as the pandemic has been, I believe there is good that has happened in this waiting. Waiting is the word we will be focusing on this Sunday. 

I was struck by this the other day when my volleyball team got a message that there was a visitation for a teammate’s mother who died unexpectedly over the weekend. Another teammate let us know at 3 pm on Monday and the entire team dropped everything they were doing to meet at 5:30 pm at the visitation on that same day. Not only did my team drop everything, but after we went through the visitation line to greet our grieving teammate another teammate pulled up a chair and said, “Let’s wait here awhile and talk.” 

Never in my life, have I just stayed and waited at a funeral home when I was not a family member, or I had a pastoral duty. This touched me deeply. Instead of hurrying back to what we had dropped to come to the visitation, we sat and talked as our grieving friend looked over to our circle and would come over here and there to talk with us and share what she was going through. In that time, another teammate told of her mom’s story, who had died of Covid in the summer. We talked about many things that would have never happened if we didn’t stay and wait. 

My prayer for you this week is that you will let down your guard for a moment and be OK with waiting, maybe even embrace it. May God give you, patience in whatever is weighing you down these days as you wait in hope and expectation. Amen. 

In Christ’s peace and love, 

Pr. Cathy