Thanksgiving Leads to Advent

    On this Thanksgiving eve I find myself enveloped in Advent thoughts and theologies, (after all, I do have to preach on Sunday...the First Sunday in Advent) and there is an interesting mix, a kind of gelling, that seems to be coming together in my mind.  I’ve never really thought much about it, but when one steps back and reflects upon Thanksgiving AND Advent, there is a beautiful unity found in bringing them together.

     On Thanksgiving we step back from our lives and think and say out loud those things for which we are thankful, and what a great thing to do!  And yet, this can be a very intimate interaction with ourselves and others.  When we think about the blessings in life, we begin to see, or should I say see again, those things which we so easily miss the rest of the year, because we become accustomed to them.  It’s intimate and humbling to realize how much we miss in life, but Thanksgiving affords us the opportunity to remember and be thankful.

    Advent, when taken seriously, can indeed be a very intimate interaction as well, for during Advent, we Christians, take a full month to examine our lives so we might be prepared for the Christ child who comes at Christmas.  In the Orthodox church Advent is sometimes called “a little Lent,” implying that it is a time to take stock of our lives and prepare ourselves.  After all, when a baby is on the way, there’s a lot to do to get our houses in order!  And THIS baby, well for Him especially, we are invited to get our spiritual houses in order.  No, we don’t jump into Christmas right away, as society does, but we watch and wait...and give thanks.

    Just as on Thanksgiving we pause to reflect upon our lives and those things for which we are thankful, so during Advent we pause to reflect upon who we are and whose we are, so that, not only are we thankful, but we are ready for the King to come.

    Michelle Blake, in The Tentmaker, wrote, “One of the essential paradoxes of Advent is that,  while we wait for God, we are with God all along, that while we need to be reassured of God's arrival, or the arrival of our homecoming, we are already at home.  While we wait, we have to trust, to have faith, but it is God's grace that gives us that faith. As with all spiritual knowledge, two things are true, and equally true, at once. The mind can't grasp paradox; it is the knowledge of the soul.”

    Such a paradox occurs when Thanksgiving ushers in the season of preparation, and it is through that paradox that we discover who Christ really is, and who we are as well.  This is the gift, and what a gift it is.

    So as you sit around your table, giving thanks for God’s many blessings, remember the blessings you have received, then spend the days leading up to Christmas doing the same, so that you will be prepared for the One who came, comes, and will come again.