Reflections the first week of Advent – Father made two comments during a homily this week that jumped out at me. #1 – As we prepare for Christmas in this Advent season, what are we really preparing for? We need to prepare to see Jesus in a new way. This has always been hard for me. I know Advent is a penitential season and we are to ‘prepare the way of the Lord’, and look into our lives so we are ready for his coming. But, in one way, it never made sense to me that we are preparing for Jesus to be born. We know that Jesus was born 2000+ years ago and have been actively trying to live that way since. So, what is new and different?
That has always been my thought process, so Advent has been more of an extended penance service for me than anything else. But, Father this morning specifically asked us what we are preparing for? How was Jesus going to come anew into our lives this year? And that was like a lightening bolt! It isn’t that I have to prepare as if a new baby was coming into our family, but in what way will Christ come into my life this year that will help me grow into a better, more like Christ person?
Over the years, I have grown and developed my spiritual life. This past year with the pandemic and all of the stresses in life, life has already morphed into something I would never have imagined a year ago. I have morphed as I have realized that by staying buried in my shroud of fat, I have actually been blocking God’s healing power within my life. I now realize that God wanted me to realize that the thought He put into my mind on retreat of the shroud wasn’t permission to allow myself to stay a victim and stay cocooned into that shroud of fat but was actually God trying to wake me up to the facts of my life and how wrong my perception was.
So, I don’t know what God has in store for me this Advent, but I do know that it is always GOOD. Come Lord Jesus, come into my life and help me better prepare for life with You in the coming year!
Stumbling on the way to Emmaus 
