Advent Adventure
December 12, 2020
Melinda S. Haag
More than once when I’ve thought about “Advent," I’ve noticed it is the beginning of another word: “adventure." Adventure in Advent? In Sunday School or Confirmation class, we may have learned that “advent” comes from an old French word (auvent) derived from a Latin word for arrival (adventus). Guess what: “adventure” derives from the same Latin verb from which “Advent” derives.
So, Advent and adventure share an origin. If we look at some of the key elements of Advent, the adventure story is clear. First, there is the Angel Gabriel, who comes to Mary saying “Be Not Afraid." Any arrival of an angel in our biblical stories immediately portends an adventure for the visited person. When it’s this particular angel, you know the adventure is going to be like a roller coaster at Great America.
Mary’s adventure is, indeed, stomach churning and unwelcome. She is a young, unmarried woman who must tell her fiancé that she has been impregnated--not by a human male. She is going to give birth to the Son of God. Joseph wonders how to save his honor and hers, without marrying, but the angel again appears to Joseph who agrees to continue his Advent journey.
Our literary and biblical canons are full of incredible and somewhat improbable adventure stories. Imagine this one: a dusty three-day trip, on a donkey, to comply with a required census, so taxes can be paid, and with a 9 month-pregnant fiancé. And Joseph, still overcome with the reality that his life is going to take him on an unplanned journey, forgets about a making a reservation for a place to stay.
Have you ever tried to talk your way into a place to stay in an unfamiliar town very late at night without a reservation? Jane and I had this experience in Utah in October and it, too, had an adventurous ending (that story another time).
The innkeeper relents, without the angel appearance, although all guest rooms are full. Joseph and Mary are given shelter in the lower level of the guest house, with the animals. Ironically, Jesus is born in a “tabernacle,” the Latin origin of which is “booth” or “hut”; both places where travelers in that time stayed during festival days, sometimes with their animals.
The incredible adventure of the life of Jesus begins and continues to Advent 2020, a year of adventures that we hope and pray not to repeat. What can we learn from Advent Year 1 as we anticipate and celebrate the familiar and beloved ritual of this season of faith in the COVID year? Life is always unexpected. The journey is not what we planned. We are afraid, even when we are told not to be. But there is always love and hope and joy and God, with us. These are the everlasting promises and eternal truths of this adventure to which God calls each of us.
Dear Holy One, help us to live the Advent life with the same spirit of adventure to which God and the Angel called Mary and Joseph, as the very human parents of Christ the child, whose birth and life are always new and renewing. Amen.
