More than candles and a cute little baby

One of the family Christmas traditions we observed in my family was lighting the candles of our Advent wreath. Amanda, being the wonderful wife that she is, found an Advent wreath a few years back that is exactly the same as the one I had grown up with. It now sits proudly on our dining room table, waiting for this Sunday when it can enter into service.

The observation of the Advent season, like most traditions, can become overly familiar, out of focus, and even useless to us. That is, if we don't constantly remind ourselves what it is we are celebrating. Among the presents, the food, the songs, and the Disney movies, we run the risk of celebrating sentimentality and nothing more, no matter how many times we remind ourselves that "Jesus is the reason for the season." Jeff Meyers makes some good points about how we should approach the Advent seasion:

The English word Advent is derived from the Latin advenire, “to come to.” Advent has to do with the Lord’s coming to us. The Lord has come to us (at the birth of Christ), regularly comes to us (especially on the Lord’s Day), and will come to us (bodily again at the end of this age). Advent season, then, is a time to reflect upon all of the ways—past, present, and future—in which the Lord comes to us.

Please remember that the purpose of Advent is not to imagine ourselves to be living at the time immediately preceding Christ’s birth and so somehow pretend that we are waiting for him to be born. It is not time for a spiritual game of “make believe.” Neither is the purpose of Advent to think sentimental thoughts about the baby Jesus. There is no real spiritual power in any of this. The purpose of Advent is to expect and pray for the coming of the Lord…

…During Advent we remember his first coming (the Lord kept his promises to his people in the OT) and we pray that the Lord will remember his promises and come to us again, judging the enemies of the church and delivering his people from all evil. This season of the church year is not “let’s pretend Jesus hasn’t been born,” but rather let’s all pray the Lord would come again to us, both now and finally at the end of the age.

Jeff has written a follow up post that is worth reading as well.