Advent

There's that certain feeling of regret that comes on Thanksgiving night, after you've stuffed yourself to the breaking point and wonder what on earth possessed you to take that second (third? fourth?) piece of pie. And the feeling is multiplied about ten times over come New Years when you've got a month of regrets haunting you.

It's not just the caloric regrets that make me squirm with discomfort after the Holidays are over, its a feeling of excess everywhere-- cramming too many activities into a schedule, too many miles driven over a weekend, too many new things sitting in my room, and too much money spent on gifts. I tend to get the same feeling after Christmas as I would if I had eaten a whole cake for dinner-- I am stuffed, but not with the right things; I'm full, but not quite the way I want to be. And it seems like, no matter how good my intentions are, each year, I get caught up in the whirlwind of activities, in the aching need for new things, in the stress & busyness that makes me full-to-breaking-point, but not satisfied.

I tend to leave Christmas with the feeling that I've missed God in it all somewhere. And just like there wasn't room for him at the inn, I always feel as though there somehow wasn't room anywhere in my schedule during Christmas for my Messiah.

So, one way that I am committing to make room this year is to keep an advent blog.
Advent is a time of expectant waiting, looking forward to the arrival of Christ the King. I am most familiar with it in the form of cardboard calendars with a piece of crappy chocolate hiding behind each number. But, growing up, I have also celebrated advent on the four Sundays before Christmas, lighting a candle on the advent wreath that symbolized a different aspect of our anticipation of Christ's coming.

My goal is to write each day a little snippet on that week's advent candle: Hope, Peace, Joy, and Love. I hope that it helps to draw my mind & heart closer to God this Christmas-- and that you might even get one or two gems from it too.
Here goes...