Advent Week 1: Hope

 

While I've fallen off the church wagon in many respects, I see no reason to throw the baby out with the bathwater, and so went out this week and got myself a set of Advent candles.

I've always loved the ritual surrounding the lighting of the candles as the earth completes its journey to the darkest days of the year, here in the northern hemisphere where I live. (I'm guessing it's safe to say this tradition was not born in Australia...) 

Even though my holiday season is not the hectic rush it once was, it's still good for my soul to pause for a moment in the darkness, then spark a small light to dispel the gloom.

As Martin Luther King, Jr. said, "Darkness cannot drive out darkness, only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that."

I can extrapolate from there: Despair cannot drive out despair, only hope can do that.

My mind was caught in the darkness as I sat down to light that first candle last night. War, climate change, political divisions, disease; Oh, my! I lit the candle anyways, then turned my mind from those dark paths to retrace the ways Hope has come into my world this past year. After a moment or three the darkness was no longer overwhelming; it was balanced by the light.

My new part time job as a gym rat - and the friends I meet there each week. The many good memories I can now revisit with a thought from all my travels this year. This Thanksgiving holiday just past, when much of my family gathered. It's a long way to travel for dinner, even when there is excellent pie to be had, but they came.

This is not to forget or to deny there are, yes, many ills in my world. But those ills are not the whole picture. Good is also ever present; I find evidence of it every time I remember to open my eyes to see.

Hope Is.