by Demi Prentiss

Advent weaves together multiple strands of our faith experience, sharpening our vision of God’s already/not yet/still-in-progress redemption of the world. I was struck by Pastor Steve Garnaas-Holmes’s poem, which encourages my hopeful waiting in this season:

Prepare

           Prepare the way of the Holy One,
           make straight the paths of God.
                         —Luke 3.4

Mary, waiting for her child, is powerless, patient,
dependent on a greater movement—
not uncertain, but also not in control.
Like waiting for the sunrise.
Waiting for God to appear in a new way.

Yet waiting like Mary is not passive,
but preparing, being transformed.

The “way” of God is not elsewhere,
some road God needs to enter the world.
God enters by the unlikeliest path,
through the least accessible means.
The Mystery will enter as Mystery wills.
So maybe to “prepare” is not so much waiting
for God to appear as changing how we see,
becoming ready to see God in new ways.

And God enters the world through us.
So waiting with Mary, we are waiting
as God transforms within us.

We are the way God is preparing.

How are you preparing yourself
to be the way God enters the world?

Deep Blessings,
Pastor Steve
__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes, Unfolding Light, http://www.unfoldinglight.net

Pastor Steve’s call to preparation reminds me of the duality we all are called to live with, expressed so beautifully in the Hasidic tale known as “Two Pockets.” It is said that Rabbi Simcha Bunem of Pershyscha always carried two slips of paper, one in each pocket. On one he wrote: Bishvili nivra ha-olam — “For my sake the world was created.” On the other he wrote: V’anokhi afar v’efer” — “I am but dust and ashes.” He would take out each slip of paper as necessary, as a reminder to himself.  A bit like Walt Kelly’s cartoon character Pogo, who offered the warning,  “We have met the enemy, and he is us.”

In the same spirit, Pastor Steve reminds us, “We are the way God is preparing.”  In the reflective posture of Pogo and the teacher Simcha Bunem, “How are you preparing yourself to be the way God enters the world?”