This morning’s church service began with words that we would never associate normally with Advent: the beautiful closing words of Zephaniah 3, with their image of a God who rejoices over us with singing. But they only seem out of place in Advent if we see the end point of Advent to be Christmas. IfContinue reading “Advent 2: Such bright morning”
Category Archives: Advent
Advent 1: Boughs bent with thickset fruit
Every Advent, living in the southern hemisphere, my family and I gather in the abundant harvest of plums that our various plum trees grow. It’s become something of an Advent tradition, where decorating the house to mark the season is accompanied by also clambering through the often thorny branches to separate what the birds haveContinue reading “Advent 1: Boughs bent with thickset fruit”
Advent Garden: Week 4
The day before the abundance breaks,I gather fallen plums and pick upfragments of tinsel shed around the trampoline.Preparing for an iso-Christmas we clean outthe fridge and I carry a tea towel full of leftovervegetables to the compost heap.Deep in the warmth of the bin, excess becomeshumus, steams and steeps in readiness fornext year’s garden. IContinue reading “Advent Garden: Week 4”
Advent Garden: Week 3
Miserly with my days, I scrooge awayminutes, hoarding time the wayothers hoard wealth, as thougheach moment to myself were a treasure hordes might steal.Bethlehem’s abundance shames me.In poverty, in absence of room,heaven brims wide with nothing to hide.The excess of my garden laughs awaythe miser in me. Come play, it chuckles.Delight.
Advent Garden: Week 2
In this city of constantseasonal confusion, the childrenmust learn and relearn yearly howsummer’s advent only sometimes meansafternoons under the sprinkler or ice cream.Sometimes it meansweeklong downpours and a garden sowaterlogged it becomes a marsh.The cross we made for “pretend Easter”now lies facedown in a puddle, a crypticsign of cradle foreshadowingCalvary, while we in thus inbetweenwatchContinue reading “Advent Garden: Week 2”
Advent Garden: Week One
Peach and plum droptiny unripe fruit scarcelybigger than a stone and Igather them for compost andto ward off rot and fruit flies.Yes, you look to the trees and seesummer declared by thesesigns of fruit. But why thiskamikaze harvest flungsenselessly early? And how manywill remain patient on the branch until time in its fullness bids themContinue reading “Advent Garden: Week One”
Advent 5
As a child, it was alwayspure anticipation, the sense of somethingpouring out of a constantlyself-filling source, readying itself solelyfor our delight. Now I keepthe list running in my head of allthat is not yet done, might not be done withoutmy doing. Though gifts still beckon, so toothe slowly nagging sense of somethingthat must be filled,Continue reading “Advent 5”
Advent 3
So rare the still point.We must come backto the same place in tinystolen moments to seehow grace grows in spite of us.Infinitesimal changesslowed and tardied by oursenseless flurryyet growing all the same.The child gift grew with Mary’s Yes;may I be quick to slow to You,to give my Yes to Your life in me.
Advent 2
Days brighten as legs lag;Christmas’ pulse confuses withAdvent slowness.How do we find stillness in this poundingpurposeful ascent to year’s climax?Many rushed home for the census but fewsaw the signs, heard the angels, glimpsed the star.Slowness humbles.In weakness, in childlikeness, come.In seasonal fluster, in thesehigh-pollen, heaty days, come.In competence, incompetence,preparedness and cluelessness, come.The season grows thatContinue reading “Advent 2”
Advent 1
Somehow, likea miracle of new birth,the children rise withall the energy of Christmas morning.I lag behind their delight,lost still in the sleep I wish I was having,yet lifted all the same to seechild hearts leapinglike an infant in the expectant womb.The waiting will be what chafes.Our spirits lag with Spirit’s time.Even by breakfast joy dwindlesContinue reading “Advent 1”
The Consolations of Writing 