Advent

Sunday, Dec. 2, was "Christian New Year's Day" as I often call it. It was the "First Sunday of Advent," the beginning of the Christian Year. For many Protestant Christians, Advent, as one of the "seasons" of the year, is a season of confusion. Many of us just aren't sure what to do with Advent.

Perhaps this will help a little: Advent is to Christmas as Lent is to Easter.

So Advent (approximately 4 weeks) and Lent (40 days) are seasons of preparation leading up to Christmas and Easter, respectively. In some places Lent has been, traditionally, a time for encouraging unbelievers to embrace Christianity--the occasion for the "spring revival meeting" in many churches--while Advent has been the time when Christians who've "dropped out" are encouraged to "Come Home for Christmas."

In any case, Advent can, and should, be a time when Christians and non-Christians are invited to think about peace, reconciliation, health, and wholeness and how these values can be better exemplified in our own lives, as individuals and as communities.

If we want peace, then we need to find a way to become peaceful and to work for peace; and here's the hard part: we need to do it in ways that don't provoke more strife and anger. Conflict and warfare are not the path to peace.

If we want reconcililation, then we need to find ways to mend fences with those nearest to us--members of our own families, our neighbors, our enemies, and the person who sits near us in worship each week. It may mean that we have to make the first move, rather than wait for the other person to "go first."

If we want health, then we have to adopt and begin to live a "healthy lifestyle." This is not to be confused with dieting, losing weight, exercising, or body building, though these things--judiciously applied--might be part of a healthy lifestyle. The healthy lifestyle means avoiding things which damage us and, at the same time, adopting habits which repair past damage and promote health for the present and future.

If we want wholeness, then we have to remember that we need to be healthy, not just physically, but also mentally and spiritually. We need to examine our beliefs, our priorities, our assumptions about "how the world works." We need to examine our attitudes and motivations and intentionally work to let go of those which damage us and those around us and, of course, work to adopt new attitudes and motivations which provide for health.

Advent, as a season of preparation, can truly be a time when we prepare for the year ahead, when we take an active role in our own lives. Someone once said there are three kinds of people: those who make things happen, those who watch things happen, and those who say, "What happened?" Advent people are the first kind.