Hope of All the Earth Thou Art

Reflection: Christmas is all around us – is it not? The lights are going up on the houses, on the streetlights and on the trees. Christmas Cookie baking contests and holiday specials are coming at us non-stop on T.V and  radio stations are playing Christmas carols at full speed.

As Christians, though, we know there is much more to Christmas’s sights and sounds. We know that it is – first and foremost about the birth of Jesus. It’s a time to open our lives to “prepare Him room” and welcome all that He brings as God’s gift to humanity and hope for the Kingdom of Heaven to come.

And we know to prepare for Christmas we need a Holy Advent -the four weeks prior to Christmas Eve. Advent means “a coming” or “an arrival.”  And during these weeks, we anticipate the celebration of Jesus’s coming to be with us – first at his birth - and again sometime in the future.

What we don’t do much of in Advent, though, is sing all-out Christmas carols! (Not in church, anyway.) Our songs – are more about waiting, hoping, longing, praying … for the day of Jesus’s return. These songs are just as beautiful as our favorite carols. And they bid us – as the season does – to slow down and appreciate the beauty in what we’re singing.

This Advent we will do just that – slow down over one song in-particular each week. One song that speaks of the gifts of hope, peace, joy and love given to us in Jesus. I hope in the end, we’ll all be more ready to sing loud and proud with the Angels proclaiming His birth on Christmas Eve.