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Advent Devotion: Waiting God's Way
CHICAGO, IL (December 9, 2003) - Covenant Communications receives more than
250 church newsletters each month and occasionally publishes devotional
material from those newsletters at www.covchurch.org. This one, called
"Waiting God's Way," comes from Don Johnson, pastor of Salem Covenant
Church, New Brighton, Minnesota.
I have been fascinated with the concept of "sacred space" every since my
sabbatical leave during the summer of 2000. That concept, the nature of
what is sacred - and what is not - has not left me alone.
In an increasingly secularized culture, where a smaller and smaller
percentage of the population participates regularly in church, I am
concerned about the loss of the sense of the sacred; the sense of the
holy. I recently searched the Internet, looking up the word "sacred
space," and found a wide variety of interesting and strange approaches
to the holy.
The hunger for the holy, however, remains deeply planted in our hearts.
Throughout the Psalms we are reminded that we are made to be receptive
to and aware of God. We hunger and thirst for God. We ache for God's
spirit. We rest in the comfort of God's presence and word.
One discovery I made is that space is less important to God than time.
Many religions have declared certain places to be inherently "holy;"
Mecca, Jerusalem, the Ganges River, Mount Fuji to name a few. These are
places where true believers think God is more present than in normal,
everyday places.
The God of the Bible, while making himself present at various places, is
not confined to one place more than another. Jesus, in talking with the
woman at the well (John 4:1-26), taught that God, being spirit, is
worshiped anywhere. What God redeems - and makes holy - is time. God
transforms our time into his time. God takes our short spans of frantic
life and sets them within the promise of eternity. God transforms
hurried lives into peaceful and gentle lives by redeeming our time.
There is no time of year where the Christian world and the secular world
collide more than during the
Christmas season. Everything seems to speed up and all of our resources
become stretched beyond their comfort margins. We spend too much, eat
too much, go out too much, and travel too much. We find ourselves in
almost constant motion - but Advent is all about waiting and
anticipating the coming of Christ as an infant back then and as redeemer
now. Each week will be a discovery of a prophetic promise for which
Israel was told to wait; for which we are also told to wait.
Grace and peace as you wait.
Prepare to
Meet Your God
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