Within Advent’s Clarity….

"One Thing Is Clear. We Are A Work In Process!"
Mark 13: 24-37; Isaiah 64: 1-9
November 27, 2005 First Week of Advent

Clarity…gaining some clarity on some things….gaining some perspective….developing some insight….standing back to get a better look. Seeing through…people, a task, my emotions, the window, my true motives. Advent’s clarity is a window to our souls. And a chance for a do-over life. To be free to be the really, real you.

Window to our souls.
If someone came by and looked through your window, what would they clearly see you doing? Literally. What would they see you are not doing? Literally.

Go outside and look through that very window onto yourself. Beyond the stuff you do/don’t do at home, what do you see in terms of how you do your life….your relationships, your choices, your health, how you communicate, your motives, what you give of yourself…. What do you see?

And looking through the office window, the car window, the sanctuary window, the department store window…what do you see yourself….being?

What do you see…as you look, what are you thinking?

There’s a connection there…a direct one! …between what you think and what you do...what you’re willing to do. So, what are you thinking? Are you thinking?

Pick a window. Any window. What do you see? It’s the window to your soul you look through.

So let’s be perfectly clear about this!

Stand back and get a new perspective on yourself. How you think about life is how you live it! How you think about yourself…how you see yourself determines how you will treat yourself…and so others. Looking in or gazing out…how do you see yourself?

From your vantage point, what gets clearer to you about you?

Do you see things through to a just end and a good completion? Or, do you bale, blame?

Do you see through people to the core of who they are and realize this is their best, and feel compassion? Or, do you judge, dump?

Do you see through your surface emotions and reactions…see to the heart of what it is you really desire, and thoughtfully respond? Or, do you react all over the place?

Do you look through the window of your own soul and see your true motives? More importantly, do you see through your own motives to your deepest soul….and get some help getting your needs met? If you don’t get your needs met, you’ll project your neediness on others. You’ll see in them what it true of you….

Advent is about stepping back from life long enough to get a better look at ourselves. It’s about developing some new insights that bring some relief, some hope, something new within that we never could conceive of on our own….and nurture it just as Mary did…just as a mother’s body nurtures a yet-unborn baby as it grows within….giving it of her very best, held in love within, not forced out before it can handle the light of day, till its formed enough to breath on its own…not too soon friends….and even then not able to make it on its own…needing to be parented as it grows up. We need each other, another.

Yes, this new perspective, new clarity we hope to gain about ourselves this season needs to be parented and nurtured and given time to grow up. Just like a baby, we are growing up again this year. A new creation. Still in process. On the potter’s wheel… Wake up! You’re on the wheel, on the way, getting clearer on some things.

If we really are being clear, if we really want to live from a new perspective as we gaze through the window of our souls, we begin by admitting to ourselves there is something more significant than the long lines of sorrow from our past at the heart of our holiday woes; something more significant than a lack of money at the heart of our financial woes; something more significant than a lack of time at the heart of our "woe is me" rushing; something more significant than a lack of entertainment at the heart of our boredom and blues woes.

Too often we don’t stop to look at what’s most significant….we just keep walking around in a fog, doing the same things we’ve always done in the same way we’ve always done them. Complaining that things never change. No dah! Trying harder to do the things that aren’t working so well in your life, won’t make them start to work all of a sudden!

We often avoid tending to what’s behind our woes, what is most significant…even when we can see it before our own eyes. Instead, we tend to seek solutions through our American genius for efficiency.

Instead of seeking inner awareness which can bring relief, instead of peace and calm which point us to new freedom, instead of seeking "better" clarity, we seek the better partner, the better job, the bigger store, the right pill, the perfect family, the harmonious church. And we often succeed, at least for a while. And then…..we can’t even see the ground we stand on, the who we are. Through the window, see: no body’s home!

Preparation for true life, real Advent, is not a matter of fixing what is wrong…simply getting what we want in our sights, taking firm stands, not even about making up your mind.

Preparation is about slowly seeing anew, setting aside the old ways and perspectives…thank God! At last a time I can use to justify a change in me! It is about looking inward to our very souls, being honest with ourselves and our God, beginning to begin to see a new life possibility. Staying on that potter’s wheel to see what can be! We shout like Isaiah: Oh tear open the heavens and come down here….keep me on the wheel…I am about to fly off! I can’t do this by myself!

Grace, not human effort or expertise or efficiency, makes this possible. Grace starts with God, but life begins with you! God knows you are a work in process. Do you? Will you give yourself a chance to see yourself in a new light? Will you look through the window of your soul this Advent?

I light this candle shining truth into our darkness, hope into our lives…the Advent of something new.

I ring this bell bringing clarity to our realities; purifying, readying the air for our prayers this day.

Listen! The Holy Hush of the Coming of God…Emmanuel!

Sing: Come to us, O Emmanuel x 4