Advent Candles

December 1^st is the starting date for most Advent calendars and candles. We still use a candle daily in our prayers, as a reminder of our approach to Christmas; and many families benefit from the ‘count-down’ to the festival provided by the ritual daily opening of the calendar window (whether or not there is a chocolate behind it.)

Certainly both practices serve as a welcome counter-cultural balance to the prevailing culture of commerce and consumption, in which Christmas has apparently already arrived;  Christmas trees and decorations are everywhere, jangled carols are played throughout shopping centres, and it is increasingly difficult to find a restaurant that isn’t serving roast turkey ‘with all the trimmings’.

By emphasising Advent as a time of preparation, we can see it as a celebration of the importance of patience, and a declaration of hope. That is why we should resist turning Advent into an anticipation of Christmas (in the original meaning of that word – ‘to use, spend, deal with in advance or before the due time.’) Rather we should be encouraged to wait – something our ‘instant’ culture finds difficult. The Church’s lectionary reminds us both of the long years of hopeful waiting that preceded Jesus’ birth (‘Adam lay y-bounden...Four thousand winters thought he not too long’) and of the waiting that Christians experience as we look forward to the second coming of the Son of Man in the final consummation of his saving work.

So today we look back, to Israel’s prophetic hope, and forward, to the fulfilment of our Christian hope, that ‘The Lord will come, and not be slow,’ remembering the early Christian acclamation – Maranatha, Come Lord Jesus!

The danger of both the Advent candle and the calendar is that while they encourage to prepare, we can become too focussed on preparing for Christmas, and miss the other message of Advent hope. Too much looking back can make us forget the God who still acts; who is – even now - doing a new thing, and who meets us in the present. However, too much gazing into the future, as some Christians do, can lead us to ignore the current needs of our world, and fail to discern the signs of God’s call to minister and witness. Besides, too much looking back or looking forward can overwhelm us - either with regret or nostalgia, or with anxiety.

St Paul reminded the Corinthians: ‘I tell you, now is the time of God’s favour, now is the day of salvation’ (2 Cor 6:2.) Advent can help us to be more aware of that truth. For as we celebrate the Lord who comes, we recall that he is the God of surprises, the God who comes unexpectedly. His birth as the son of Mary makes that plain; and we are told that his second coming will be ‘like a thief in the night.’

But he also comes now - whether to meet us in our need, or to challenge us in our complacency. Advent is the season of celebration of the God who is eternally with us and still makes himself known in the sacrament of the present moment.