Preparation

Advent.

A season in the church year that is beautiful because of it's subtlety, expectation, and it's quietness. This is the way the church begins the liturgical year. No giant celebration, no great feasts, or festivals, but with gentle and quiet preparation.

I have been reflecting on this season in a different way this year because for the first time I am playing such an active part in planning it. As I prepare for each service, the preparation for each service brings out a stark revelation that I have never been truly aware of before. We have adulterated the season of Advent as much as we have the season of Christmas. We have twisted it to be about us, about what we can do, about how we can prepare for the coming of Christ.

This has become more and more apparent as I have read the texts for this week. Malachi 3:1-4 speaks of one who will come who is like a refiners fire, and like fuller's soap. Both of these things include preparing. The refiner's fire prepares silver and gold, burning away all of the impurities until it is a precious metal able to be made into a working object. Fuller's soap is a harsh soap that was used to bleach away all of the impurities in fabric preparing it to be used for fine garments. Both of these objects are used to make something ordinary into a thing of extraordinary value. Yet the value of the refined and cleaned object is not only because it is refined, but also because it is now usable. These ordinary things in life have been prepared for great use.

It is a fitting passage for Advent, a time of preparation. But we have taken Advent to mean what we do to prepare. The Malachi passage speaks of the one who is sent, our beloved Lord, as the one who will do the preparing.

Yet then we turn to Luke 3:1-6 and we hear John the Baptist tell us to prepare the way, prepare a highway, make this flat, tear mountains down and fill up valleys. We get excited about this of course because if there is anything we know how to do it is to tear things down and then cover over others. After all that is how we have been making roads and the way for kings to travel for centuries. We can do that. Yet when we look at our history, even just the brief period of history that Luke writes of in those first few lines, what we see is a path of destruction and brokenness left behind a human ruler who was hungry for power and control.

If I am sure of anything when it comes to our God it is that God does not work as we think He will. When in history has God ever done what was promised in a way that the people expected?

With that in mind it makes perfect sense that this time of Advent is another paradox in our faith life.

Prepare the way of the Lord, but be aware that you can not be the one who does the preparation. Make the highway straight, but the road Jesus will travel is not one made of human hands. Every mountain will be made low, every valley filled, but only God can tear down our high defenses and fill our empty holes and broken souls. Prepare everything to be precious in God's sight, but Jesus is the one who will be the refiner.

God is the mover in our season of Advent. God is the one who prepares us. Our Lord sits with us as we live through the refiner's fire, shaping us and burning away all of the impurities until we are so pure and precious that, just as silver does when it is ready to be removed from the fire, we show the reflection of our maker.

Make you reflect the preparation of our God the Advent season.