Welcoming First Advent Sunday

My favorite color is indigo. Next to that is mauve. Next to mauve is lilac. All these three comes from one family color. They are all combination of red and blue primary colors. Red is love and anger while blue is serenity and indifference. These color can symbolize both War and Peace.

Today we mark the first Sunday of the Advent season. The color of Advent is violet. Advent is not about war and peace. It is about waiting for the Lord. It is about waiting. A normal scenario of human life. We are bombarded by so much waiting and waiting. When you are at the MRT station. When you are alone and supposed to meet someone. When you are too young to have a girlfriend. When you are a second year high school who wants to wear a toga. When it is not the right time for something. You always wait. I always wait. We all wait for something, sometime.

Advent is about waiting for the second coming and making present also the waiting for the baby Jesus born of Mary--for Christmas.

Every time i encounter the word waiting I remember a quotation from a book i read long time ago. It says and I quote;

Waiting is surrendering to God who loves us and who knows what is best for us. Waiting helps us grow in virtue. It likewise means allowing things, events, and people to flourish, to evolve, to emerge to their fullest potential.

--A Matter of the Heart p.57
by Fr Jose Aripio
Provincial Superior of SSP Phil.-Macau province

Let us focus and contemplate to this.

Waiting is surrendering to God. Everyone during Advent is invited to surrender their whole heart and soul to God. If by waiting we mean preparation for the coming of Christ, we cannot be prepared enough unless otherwise we surrender to God. Saint Paul in the second reading teaches us that we should turn away from drunkenness and other promiscuous activities.

Waiting helps us grow in virtue. When you wait you always thought that time is wasted. instead of doing something, you are spending it for waiting which for most of us is an idle activity. But while you are waiting for something God also gives you time to hope for something. Hope cannot be realized when you do not wait. You can only hope when there is something unknown in the future and you wait for it. That makes waiting very very precious. It gives you an opportunity to be hopeful. While you wait you're etiquette is also tested by fire. you will be able to gauge how much you believe in something and cling for a certain conviction. Waiting strengthens your fundamental beliefs whether you notice it or not. Lastly, the very least virtue you can improve on while waiting is patience. By being patient you learn to relax and avoid hurrying. Being patient is a sign of a clam Christian and a dignified one.

Waiting is allowing things to evolve and emerge to their fullest potential. Whenever I am asked whether as a Christian I believe in Evolution I say yes. I believe that God did not really create everything in 7 days. 7 days is very symbolic and it can mean 7 years or 7 centuries even. God allows creation to evolve. God is never in a hurry because He has no time limit. He is eternal. I believe that when you pray, God may sometime answer it late because there nothing late in the viewpoint of God. God simply wants us to wait. In waiting you can enjoy things you might not enjoy if everything is instant and that is what we call serendipity. Hurrying is not a virtue and not even an act of a dignified individual. A learned Christian knows how to wait for his turn.

Surely you can wait until Christmas...