Brief synopsis of the readings: Near the beginning of the Book of Isaiah we read that in “days to come the mountain of the Temple of the Lord shall tower above the mountains.” All nations will stream to it. God will rule and his subjects “will beat their swords into ploughshares, their spears into pruning hooks. One nation shall not raise the sword against another, nor shall they train for war again.” Matthew’s Gospel describes Jesus’ words to his disciples: “As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. In those days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day that Noah entered the ark. They did not know until the flood came and carried them all away. So will it be also at the coming of the Son of Man” Jesus then counseled his followers to stay awake as they don’t know when the master will come. “The Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect.”

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Can I be the first to say this? We just don’t really know what to do with Advent. Lent, by comparison, is easy. We start on Ash Wednesday by fasting and abstaining from meat, we give up something we like for six weeks and we end with Good Friday where we (again) fast and abstain. This mirrors the six weeks Jesus spent in the desert before he is arrested, tried, crucified, and buried. By the time we hit Easter we feel like we’ve accomplished something.

But while we know that Advent commemorates four weeks before Christmas, it seems like the Christmas season begins long before. Many of us remember the excitement in September when the Sears Christmas catalog arrived. We see toys, decorations and the like crowding out not only Thanksgiving but also Halloween. I sometimes wonder if Labor Day won’t someday commemorate not only the end of summer but also the beginning of Christmas.

While we’re on the subject, our readings today point to the future, of waiting for something to happen. As a people we’re not particularly good at waiting (as evidenced by the beginning of the homily). We tend to see waiting as a waste of time, as something we shouldn’t have to do. We pay extra or use our influence to “cut in line” or get to the front either because we see our time as valuable or because we fear what we want will run out before we get our turn.

It’s also been my experience that some have moved away from Advent as waiting and attempted to look at it through the eyes of being prepared. That sounds less passive than waiting but it’s also fraught with difficulties. Not the least of which is that there is no roadmap for preparation here. We study if we’re taking a test. We lose weight to see the doctor. We floss before the first date. But how do we prepare for the birth of Jesus?

And how do we prepare during this season? This is the time of year we feel we need to fire up the cookie sheets, mail out the perfect Christmas newsletter and find the secret parking space at the shopping center. I’m pretty certain that we don’t celebrate Advent by adding stress to an already stressful time.

So let’s look in a different direction. We know that Jesus wasn’t born on December 25th and it’s generally assumed that the early Christians chose to piggyback on the pagan celebration of Saturnalia. This may have been for political reasons but maybe it was chosen because, at least in the northern hemisphere, it comes during the shortest days of the year.

It appears this time of darkness almost universally calls us to look to the light. Our Jewish neighbors celebrate Hanukkah. Members of the Africa diaspora in the United States commemorate Kwanzaa. Wiccans celebrate the Winter Solstice (as their ancestors celebrated Saturnalia). Finally, fans of the sitcom Seinfeld celebrate Festivus.

This takes nothing away from our celebration of Advent and Christmas. Advent reminds us that even in the midst of darkness we are a people of hope and light. Years ago I saw a poster that said this: Jesus didn’t light a candle. He crashed into our darkness. Every day for the next month our daylight will become incrementally shorter and while we know intellectually it will turn around despair comes easy.

As we look around our world today we see and abundance of war, discrimination and hate. We need look no further than the World Cup in Qatar to see institutional hate and intolerance. But there was darkness during the time immediately before Jesus’ birth also. They lived under the thumb of an oppressive and brutal Roman empire and while they had some freedom to worship as they wished they spent much of their lives knowing it could all be taken away.

But they knew, and we need to remember, that times of darkness are the times that we need to seek the light all the more. Perhaps that means we try not to get angry when someone cuts us off in traffic. Or that we hold open a door for someone a few seconds more than we usually do. Maybe it’s as simple as taking a few seconds at the end of the day to remind ourselves of our blessings.

Granted this isn’t always easy. When we drive home after dark and someone takes our parking place when we know it’s our last chance to get to the store to buy the perfect gift for the perfectly ungrateful in-law, we’re reminded of this. But tomorrow morning there will be a glow on the eastern horizon that reminds us that it was worth the wait.