Sunday, November 30, 2014
First Sunday of Advent
Isaiah 63:16-17
You, Lord, are our father. Why do you let us wander from your ways, and harden our hearts so that we no longer fear you? Return!
God’s word to us is the same: “Return!” Strange feeling, to be so close and yet so far from one another, both longing for each other’s presence.
I am confused and frustrated by what seems like God’s absence. He knows me better than I know myself; he can guide my steps and every moment of my life would be filled with joy and content.
But I am like a chicken suddenly escaped into the field, running amok with freedom, pecking at every green sprout in sight, flying fast away from anything that tries to catch me.
Finally far off in the corner of the green, coop nearly invisible to my poor dry eyes, there is silence. Now I can eat, now I can rest, now I can be alone in my freedom. The sun shines. God’s sun shines on me.
Until night. In this sudden dark I am afraid. I cry out, “Oh, Father, return!” Bring the light, find me, blind me if that’s what it takes, but find me and bring me back to where I’m made to be.
That cry resounds today. Filled with repentance and fear, we celebrate our own return and wait with held breath for God’s. It’s high time.
O come o come and ransom captive Israel. Ransom me, Emmanuel. God with us, God with us, God with us, and us … with God.
http://www.christiancounselingservice.com/archived_devotions.php?article_id=1295
