Perseverance in Hope

There is one thing that I hate. One thing that scares me. One thing that is super hard for me in following God. Well... more than one thing if I am honest. But there is one thing that comes back me a lot!

Perseverance.

I am caught up with all of these thoughts about it. I am close to God for now. But what about tomorrow?  

I have been reading the Bible for now, but what about later on?

Am I going to lose this? How can I keep it up?

Some of these are silly questions. Ones that keep going around in my brain like a happy hamster running on his wheel.

I know those scenarios are not likely to happen. Yet perseverance is still hard for me on a daily basis.

A friend reminded me a few days ago just how long the Jews waited for Jesus to come.

Four thousand years.

One of my favorite songs is a A Thousand Years by Christina Perri. 

A thousand years seems like forever to me. Yet the Jews waited for four times longer than that. Dip into the Old Testament and see the waiting. 

The wandering, the wondering. Even before entering the Promised Land the Jews wandered for 40 years in the desert. 

Like the Jews in the four thousand years before Christ’s birth we have to persevere.

Persevere in that hope that is the longing for Christmas. Embracing the flaws, suffering, loneliness, longing because all of this is to God.

Sometimes you get to Christmas and it seems like the waiting isn't even over yet. The waiting to be healed and transformed. The waiting to be transformed.

When this happens, realize that you are called to wait in hope, in hope for the coming of the kingdom.

A coming that is not even fulfilled by Christmas. We are still waiting in joyful hope for his second coming. 

Persevere in hope.

Be not Afraid! I am praying for you.

~Emily

Enter in

It's Advent! This strange liturgical season squeezed in right before Christmas where we are supposed to be doing a million things. Like buying presents, going holiday shopping, cooking, decorating all things and keeping up with our normal lives!

Buying presents for everyone who you have ever met? (I may exaggerate.)  It can all be exhausting. I know that it often feels like that for me. Honestly I feel much of the time like Advent is just one last thing to do.. Right on top of a high list of expectations and things we really need to do in our lives right now.

Ever since I have started college, Advent has seemed rushed and even panicked.

Here's how it goes for me. 

Advent Week 1

Thanksgiving happens, which is all well and good, time spent with family and friends being grateful. All is great and  then comes Monday. The day after break when essentially all hell breaks loose and you discover that you have approximately 1,00o things to do this week! Plus it's Advent so you know spend a great deal of time feeling guilty about not being Advent-y enough and shopping because it's Cyber Monday and we all need a jump start on the 1,000 presents to buy.

This week you have just started is also the last week of classes so you can be prepared to be swept away  by classes, projects, and things you forgot to do until the very last minute.

Advent Week 2.

Then finals week comes and you barely manage to pray on Sunday. You subsist more off of coffee than anything else. You eat, sleep ( a little), and dream class notes and exam taking.

Advent Week 3

You arrive home the next week exhausted and promptly sleep/watch Christmas movies for the next three days. Plus go to a few Christmas parties your parents dragged you too. Not to mention-it's the pink week of Advent which means joy and quite realistically the only joy you can imagine is your pillow. Besides the fact that you still have not even thought about Advent or done anything about it because exhaustion has set in. 

I hope I am the only one who experiences this beautiful season in this magical way (sarcasm intended. ) But I know that is not the truth. The hustle and bustle, the business that accompanies all of this can drag us down.  Our expectations and the Target website failing to respond can get to us.

Which is why I am going to enter in. To enter into the crazy, the stressed, the mess. I am not going to wish it all to go away. Often I think, if only this were different, if my life were different I could enter in more fully to Advent. 

Only that is not true. It's my life. I will still have the same life 10 years from now because I am still me.

So I am going to enter in, and I am going to ask the Lord to enter into it all with me. To enter in with me to the stress, the websites that refuse to respond, the exams that have to be taken, the shopping that needs to be done. I am going to get the important things done but I am not going to do them alone. I am going to enter into it all with the Lord. To have him help me everyday because no matter what season it is, He is and always will be my lifeline.

I am going to enter into the mystery, that is the here and now, the today. I am going to enter into this season and savor all of it. I am going to enter in with the Lord.

If two minutes in the Bible is all the time I can spend while trying to get it all done then I will enter fully into those two minutes. 

Be not Afraid!

-Emily