practices for a season of longing & waiting
In church ministry, the fall can often feel like one extended sprint from back-to-school through Christmas. But about seven years ago our church discovered Advent and it has truly changed how we approach and experience the holiday season, which is now upon us.
If we’re not intentional about how we spend our time – personally and on the church calendar – we’ll arrive in January tired, burnt out, and broke, having mostly missed the wonder of Christmas.
Like all beautiful things, Advent is multi-faceted: the more you explore the more riches you will find. Advent tutors us in the way of faithful watching and waiting. It confronts us with the darkness of our world and gives us space to voice our honest longings and disappointments in song and prayer. Advent removes the plastic veneer of the secularized Christmas season and reminds us that God usually comes as an unexpected interruption into the rawness of our lives.
The space that Advent creates allows our true longings to come to the surface and we have a choice in what we do with them. We can either temporarily satiate them with parties, spending, and hustle or we can face them head on in the presence of God and trust that He’ll meet us in that space. Advent calls us to the courageous practice of crying out in faith, “How long, O Lord?” and exposes all of the hollow ways we seek to cope with our anger and disappointment. Advent is the season we need, but often lack the courage to embrace.
Most of our churches aren’t accustomed to participating with the full season of Advent. For us it’s been a multi-year experiment. If something in the above paragraphs resonates with you here are a few simple ways that you can partner with the spirit of Advent in services this year.
Sing about waiting and longing
There are plenty of songs that align with the spirit of Advent that are already in our repertoires.
It may seem counter-intuitive, but the main thing we’re waiting for as the Church is the second coming. Israel waited for the Messiah to come and we wait for Him to return. It’s also highly appropriate to change the dynamic of our music to be less peppy and more somber. Some of you can get away with leaning deeper into this than others, but Advent should be marked by space. This might be the time to do less songs so you can stretch them out and create space for people to “be” with their thoughts, feelings, and longings in the safe presence of God. We can sing about longing and waiting, but it’s even more formative to practice it. I should also mention that it’s helpful to resist rushing into Christmas at the turn of December. Typically, the first two weeks of Advent are completely focused on the second coming, which means we’re not yet singing songs about the Incarnation.
Add elements of liturgy
For some churches any departure from the implied service flow will be too radical, but I would encourage you to break the mold of what is typical and add an element or two that will help frame Advent as its own season. In secular culture even Advent has become another thing to market and capitalize from, but its essence is exactly the opposite. It should be the anti-venom to immediate gratification and adding something like an Advent wreath liturgy with candle lighting can help frame a congregation’s expectations for the season. One simple way to implement this would be to have the five candles front and center and somewhere in the worship set have a designated person come share about the themes of Advent, light the candle, and read a Scripture followed by a moment of corporate prayer. It’s amazing how few of our churches regularly participate in corporate prayer and Scripture reading, which were foundational practices in the gathering for nearly all of Christian history. I’m not here to shame anyone, but Advent is the perfect time to lead your congregation in weekly prayer around the four contemporary themes – hope, peace, love, and joy. You could pray crafted prayers on the screen or guide the congregation in a moment of reflection on the theme and ask them to pray on their own.
Find a good daily devotional
I’m not a “daily devotional” kind of guy. I’ve tried the best of them (My Utmost for His Highest and the like) and rarely do I make it to the end. But Advent is a four week season that’s out of sight out of mind between Sundays until it becomes a regular rhythm, which could take 5-10 years. Our church began providing daily devotionals for our congregation as a way of helping people engage with the season of Advent rather than just accommodating a few different feeling services between Thanksgiving and Christmas. We’ve tried digital and physical and I recommend physical. From the stage we encourage families to engage them around the dinner table, and if the devotional is worth its salt, it will lead to meaningful conversation and prayers. Honestly, the daily devotional has become the backbone of Advent for our congregation and the weekend gatherings reinforce the themes we’re all reading the other six days of the week.
This brief season on the calendar calls us to be attentive and intentional with the rest of our lives. As ministers we would do well to engage it as a gift from the Church to our churches that we might be people of true hope, peace, love and joy in a world of despair, tribalism, apathy, and malaise. Happy Adventing.
May God meet you in a profound way.