A Blessed Advent to all!
For the entire season of Advent, I’ll be posting entries from my original Advent devotional ebook, Pilgrim God, every week.
Thank you for joining us!
Before we begin our devotional, I wanted to share a Comment Highlight from last week:
Today I want to share the two responses to last week’s discussion, all about the unexpected things we are grateful for. I found both responses very moving.
wrote:It would be no surprise to say that I am thankful for my son’s current stint in a long-term rehabilitation program (6 months sober tomorrow!), but what *is* weird is that I am thankful for his addiction. Sure, four years of watching your child struggle and wondering every day if he was going to OD was hell, but he has grown so much because of what he has been through. At almost-21, he has a clarity I couldn’t imagine until I was nearly 30.
And Megan Meyer wrote:
Grief. I’m well-acquainted with grief, but grief has taught me so much. I am wiser, and my priorities are regularly evaluated. Life has a depth, and I have an appreciation for life I wouldn’t have if it weren’t for grief.
Both so profound! Thank you for sharing!
If you want a chance to be featured in next week’s Comment Highlight, all you have to do is post a comment on any of this week’s posts or threads. That’s it!
Now, on with this week’s devotional…
home is the testimony of the silent things: the unlit hearth, the garden gate, the rug, the kitchen sink, the chill of the floor in the morning, the evening lamplight spilling from the open front door.
As the winter cold throws the leaves from the trees and the rains and snows and frosts threaten, we turn like hibernating creatures to our dens. No two homes are alike, and all carry Advent in their bones, pregnant with beginnings. Â
In the dim light of the first Advent candle, we may see our homes differently. Every home, no matter what or whom it contains, is a testimony to God’s providence.
Advent is a celebration of hidden holiness in the littlest things, the simplest things.
In this season we are awakened to the Possible. If a tiny woman in a tiny town in a distant era of history can carry God in her womb, then perhaps the cooking-pot that holds the soup, the oatmeal, the pasta can be holy. Perhaps the lightbulb that shines on our book, our bed, our bathtub is holy. Perhaps the chairs and couches that uphold us are holy, as well. The appliances. The technology on our tables, in our pockets. All of these are little things, ready to be blessed.Â
No object is holy on its own, but each can be a vessel for God’s grace. All it takes is an open door, a willingness to see with a child’s eye.
And when we use these holy, little, simple things to share love with others--friends, family, strangers--all the better. The Possible becomes the Real.
The testimony of the silent things, the little things, in the wild world of our Pilgrim God, often speak loudest of all.
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I think everything you write is so beautiful, but this really struck me:
“No object is holy on its own, but each can be a vessel for God’s grace. All it takes is an open door, a willingness to see with a child’s eye. “
That’s really, really beautiful.
This is so beautiful, S.E. What a beautiful poem and devotional for the first week of Advent.