‘Do’ less in order for God to ‘do’ more

Being awake is more important than the absence of sleep. It is the constant alertness to the reality that self-interest leaves us unprepared when God calls. Doing what you like is freedom: liking what you do is happiness. When you think you’ve reached the peak — keep climbing.

Too often we view Advent as a penitential season rather than as a time to re-focus our lives. The effort to observe Advent as a ‘mini-Lent’, while carrying out Christmas shopping, listening to carols and joining in the optimistic mood prevailing is often jarring. Perhaps we would be better this Advent to abandon the struggle of trying to overhaul our lives and instead focus on our relationship with God. Perhaps we need to ‘do” less in order for God to ‘do’ more. Let’s focus on what Advent is instead.

God of exiles, keep calling us home. You know the yearnings of our hearts. You also know how easily we can lose our way, May this Advent season be a time of coming home to the best of who we are. May our personal home comings influence all this earth. We walk this day with hopeful hearts, believing that your justice and compassion will bring comfort and freedom to all who are in exile.

Advent is a season of the pilgrim God, the God who hungers for our love, the God who intrudes into humans’ history by being born as one of us. For a people who often speak of our journey toward God, we forget that it is God who does most of the travelling. The God who is already present in the very depths of who we are draws nearer and invites us to respond. This God insists on breaking through the wasteland into the wilderness of our hearts.

Fr Des