This is an extract from 'A Shaking Reality' by Bishop Peter Price, a book of readings for Advent.
As the leaves of Autumn start to turn, my preparation for Advent begins. I scour book reviews and talk with friends about what to read. I look for liturgies that might give me a fresh perspective on God's promise of redemption and release. The resources gathered, like a squirrel hoarding food I hide them away until Advent dawns.
For more than fifty years we have made an Advent wreath from greenery collected from hedgerows and woods. Five new candles – three purple, marking the patriarchs and matriarchs, the prophets and John the Baptist; one pink for Mary the Mother of God; and one white for the birth of the Christ Child – are added. All are placed on a stand. The candles will be lit on each of the four Sundays, and then on Christmas Day itself.
When our children were growing up, we set the Advent wreath in the entrance to our house. Each night candles were lit. An Advent Calendar adorned the wall. Behind each day's 'doorway' some picture of the Christmas story would appear along with a biblical text. Taking turns each evening one of us would light the candle, open the window, and read the text. Together we prayed an Advent prayer.
'We teach our children how to measure, how to weigh,' observed Rabbi Joshua Herschel. 'We fail to teach them how to revere, how to sense wonder and care.' Often during our Advent observation, a serendipitous moment of stillness settled upon us. A quiet wondering.
Now with just the two of us at home, the wreath is smaller, simpler: the calendar has been replaced with a pyramid of little boxes. Each contains a small surprise and a prayer. We still light the candle and say the prayer. 'Thirty-seven seconds, well used, is a lifetime,' as Mr Magorium observes. Now as we recall more Advents past than to come, we remember, we wait, and we anticipate.
In each of the homes in which we have lived we have sought to create 'sacred space'. Often this has been a simple table in a corner, covered with a cloth, bearing a candle, an icon, a cross and Bible.
For a privileged while we lived in a medieval house where I had a beautiful study. It was a place that came into its own in the winter. I would come downstairs early to light a wood fire in the large grate. Stepping out into the woodshed, I would collect a box of prepared sticks and logs. My first prayer of the day was one of gratitude for friends who had cut, stacked and boxed the wood that would warm my visitors and me each day.
Kneeling at the hearth, striking a match, there was the moment of anticipation as the paper and twigs caught fire. The sight of the first bluey-grey smoke, the crackle of wood, the explosive pum-pum-pum of the flames, followed by the slower, deeper burning of the logs. Later their sweet incense would fill the room, warmed by the gentle heat of glowing embers.
The fire lit. The space prepared. The sounds of crackling wood, and my own breathing in and out, gave way to a gathered stillness. In the window a lamp reflected. Outside a winter moon set beneath the Morning Star. Time to be, not to do. Stillness and the mystery of silence.
Whilst it is an increasingly distant yet treasured memory, I recall the experience, and appreciate the truth of words from the poet Vera Newsom:
Young we love, grasp, consume. Old we savour
And the taste sends us wild.
Today we still create space – especially at Advent. In the tiny hut we grandly call 'The Garden House' hangs a plaque inscribed: 'Bidden or Not, God is present.' In the delightful story of The Little Prince, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry writes of a little boy who comes to Earth from a tiny planet in space. Here he encounters a fox whom he wants to befriend. The shy fox suggests, 'Let us sit near each other and look at one another each day.' By so doing, Prince and fox can gain a fresh perspective. Then, says the fox, 'each day we can move a little closer. Then we can become friends.'
It is a story that serves us well at the beginning of Advent. Advent is a time to both recall and anticipate. We reflect on the familiarity of the nativity story – the One who has come. The New Testament offers us two further perspectives: the 'One who is come' – present continuous: and the 'One who will come' – future.
When Jesus took his leave from his disciples following the resurrection, he promised: '... remember I am with you always to the end of the age.' Here the crucified, risen and soon-to-be ascended One promised a continuous 'is-ness': 'I shall pour out my Spirit on all humanity.'
St Luke, the author of the Acts of the Apostles, tells us of the 'One who will come'. He speaks of 'the coming of the Lord's great and glorious day'. Here, there is a sense of finality, a wrapping up of history. The Book of Revelation puts it poetically: 'See the home of God is among mortals. He will dwell with them; they will be his peoples and God himself will be with them; he will wipe away every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more: mourning and crying will be no more, for the first things have passed away.'
Each day in Advent, like the Little Prince, we are invited to move a little closer to the One who has, is and will come. Each day provides an opportunity to change our perspective. Each day we can risk re-making friendship with the One who calls us friends. Each day we can face the reality of an 'uncertain future'. And each day we can anticipate 'something better to come'.
...
Advent bids us set aside time for reflection. A time to allow for a 'new understanding of God's promise of redemption and release'. A time to respond to whatever Inner Voice speaks from the day's reading. A time to experience Advent's 'shaking reality'. Light a candle. Say the prayer, and let the Ever-Present Presence of the Divine be revealed. 'Breathe in, breathe out.' Learn to 'sit near' and each day move a little closer to the God who has come, is come, and will come again.
A Prayer
Almighty God
give us grace to cast away the works of darkness
and put on the armour of light,
now in the time of this mortal life,
in which your Son Jesus Christ came to visit us in great humility,
that in the last day
when he shall come again in his glorious majesty
to judge both the quick and the dead,
we may rise to the life immortal;
through him who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
(Collect for the First Sunday in Advent, Common Worship – Services and Prayers for the Church of England)
Rt Rev Peter B Price is a former Bishop of Bath and Wells, an author and broadcaster. 'A Shaking Reality: Daily Reflections for Advent' is published by DLT.
