Tomorrow will be the Third Sunday in Advent, and I think about all the things I have not yet done, like putting together my annual Christmas letter to be mailed with cards to people most of whom I have not seen in years. During the year certain events or particular dates bring them to mind, but, I usually wait to Advent to tell them how they have figured in this year coming to an end.
Some have suffered the loss of those they loved to the dread pandemic that seems to rule our lives. Others among us have suffered the loss of those they loved due to gun violence. The Psalmist tells us that if we truly love or have faith we will not fear. But what does that really mean?
We struggle in these uncertain times with our faith; we hope that more peaceful times will once again emerge in our lives. We pray but also know we must do more than mouth the words in our hearts; we know that we must work for peace in all its forms. We must do so in the spirit of real expectation and that our work will yield fruit.
Prayer for the Day
Gentle Teacher, we do not understand how to seek you
Or how to be truly vulnerable to you and each other.
Remove our reluctance and teach us to accept your Spirit
As we strive to live your good news in the world.
May we be open to your gifts of courage, discipline and peace,
So we become your servants open to the world.
As was the One who served you fully and completely,
Even Christ Jesus our Lord.
Thoughts for the Day
When despair for the world grows in me and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be, I go and lie down
where the wood drake rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
Wendell Berry, from “The Peace of Wild Things”
Ultimately, we have just one moral duty: to reclaim large areas of peace in ourselves, more and more peace, and to reflect it toward others. And the more peace there is in us, the more peace there will also be in our troubled world.
Etty HIllesum, Dutch writer, murdered at Auschwitz (1914-1943)
How sweet are your words to my taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth;
Through your teaching, I obtain understanding, therefore hating every false way
Psalm 119: 103-104