The lighting of a candle on the Advent wreath, the meditative moment, the perambulations through sacred spaces, the kneeling at a nativity scene – these are all God times, writes Ann Rennie. Source: The Good Oil.
Human beings are no longer good at waiting. We want everything now, immediately, Googling the answer, paying with a smartphone, uploading to TikTok. There is no anticipation, no patience, no gracious waiting, just instant gratification.
In the past, waiting was a necessary part of life; waiting for letters that took six weeks to arrive, waiting for exam results, waiting for news of loved ones, waiting as the fullness of time took its course.
But we seem to have lost the art of the slow and tender, of time unspooling in ribbons of reverie, rather than being wrenched open by digital demand.
The gift of time untrammelled, of time slowed and special, seems to be anachronistic in a world that is spinning faster and faster … and losing its way.
Human time, chronos, keeps us all in its tight-fisted and tyrannical thrall. We clock on and off. We run to a timetable, squeezing more in, being caught up in improvised importance and self-appointed urgencies, proving our worth by the hours we put in, the busyness we create, the drama of being all things to all people.
We are enslaved to here and now and hurry and quick and deadline! In our haste to always be doing, we run out of time for the things that really matter.
This Advent, we have the opportunity to reacquaint ourselves with a different dimension of time, God’s time, kairos. This is the time of waiting in hopeful expectation, the time of pondering, lingering, reflecting, sitting with ourselves and thinking and praying about what Christmas really means.
Advent is the season of the quiet adventure of the spirit. It is the time to be watchful, to stay awake, to be ready, to wait well for what is coming. Advent leads us to the baby Jesus, as well as reminding us that he will come again in a time of his making.
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Advent: the season of the quiet adventure of the spirit (By Ann Rennie, The Good Oil)
