ADVENT — IN PRAISE OF LONGING

This entire story happened in twenty-five seconds. Someone walked past wearing a pair of shoes. A guy says, “Dude, those are some cool shoes,” and takes a photo of those shoes. Then, he uploads the photo to Google, finds out what kind of shoes they are, goes to Amazon, orders them in his size, and has his very own pair on the way. In twenty-five-seconds. For context, that means this could’ve happened twice before The Chicks say the word “cowboy” in Cowboy Take Me Away. Twice.

I realize shoes are not the same as the rest of life, but I think we have a frustrated relationship with longing. At best, we tolerate it as a natural byproduct of a thousand insurmountable obstacles as we wait for what we want. At worst, it is the painful space where we are forced to reckon with the gap between what is and what we think should be. Our cultural response to the silence of longing is usually to find out what else we can tighten up, what inefficiencies we can trim, and what middlemen we can cut out. And while there are certain areas where this is helpful, we seem to believe that any inefficiency is a problem. Any form of waiting is a liability to be addressed.

But longing is such a beautiful part of being human. It’s in our longing that we learn what we truly want. It’s in our longing like nowhere else that we feel our hearts burn and come to life with desire. And this is where Advent comes in.

Advent is a counter-instinctual celebration of longing, a response to silence. For me this year, Advent is an invitation to consider how I respond to the silence of longing in my life. And that begins with honesty. What longings do I feel? What am I waiting for? What is not true that I wish was, both in my individual life and in the world around me? And then how do I respond to those silences? Do I ignore them? Do I try and hurry their end? You can respond to longing in so many ways, and Advent is our chance to consider how we’d like to respond.

So this Advent Season, I’d invite you to not see your longings not as a liability to overcome, but a gift to pay attention to as a way your heart is communicating to you about your deepest desires. Advent makes us recognize how we will respond to the silence of longing in our lives, and what that means for who we are.