advent: journeying toward the coming joy

I’m not really much for Christmas traditions, or any holiday traditions. I feel pretty strongly about having apple pie at most holidays, and that’s about as traditional as I get. When I was kid, we always visited my grandparent’s house on Christmas Eve, which was also my grandfather’s birthday. So we ate, opened presents and more than likely watched a VHS about deer hunting. On Christmas Day, we would wake up and open our gifts as a family, and have breakfast (sometimes it was a poptart, sometimes it was blueberry muffins…) and then spend the rest of the day with my mom’s side of the family eating and swapping presents. The only real consistencies of our Christmas traditions were celebrating my grandfather’s birthday, eating, opening presents, and reading the Christmas story, probably from Luke.

All that to say - my family is wonderful, and my parents always did their best to make sure we had wonderful Christmases. Now that I’m older and live on my own, the holidays look different. I don’t really care about decorating - last year, I didn’t even put up a tree. See, Christmas is pretty hard for me. I’m one of those people that we speak about in conceptual terms every holiday season - “Be kind! The holidays are hard for some people!” Yes, they are. I’m some people. About the time the weather starts shifting and it starts getting dark about 3 PM (joking, but for real), I start fighting a little harder to find that joy the rest of you seem to source so easily. I have incredible family and friends, but that doesn’t change the fact that there is no husband living in this house and no little hands holding gifts and making cookies. Christmas is more magical in community, and there’s just no question about that.

In fact, I would argue that most things are more magical in community. We were designed to function as the body of Christ, gathering together, celebrating and singing together with hopeful hearts, “O come, O come, Immanuel.” The last couple of years have split us apart, physically and emotionally. We have seen the widening chasm of opinion separate us into ideological tribes, furthered still by fear - whether it be of sickness or of others. We have become fearful of being in community. To be joined together with those people who believe differently, worship differently, vote differently, live differently? At this point, it seems improbable. We sit in our tribes and discuss our “correct” ideology, forsaking our neighbors because it feels good to be made right in our own eyes, or in the eyes of those in power around us. We are utterly predictable in our humanity.

While tribalism feels like community, it is only a shallow replica of the fullness found in the body of Christ. Tribalism says you belong - but only as long as you agree with all of the tenets of my philosophy. If you disagree, you have to find a new tribe. I’ll tell ya - it’s really hard to agree with everything that every single member of that tribe believes in. We are human - broken and multi-faceted. Each one of us has different perceptions and opinions. Christ’s community (I am not referring to denominations, but that is a discussion I would deeply love to have) makes way for varied thoughts, stages of life, philosophies and discussion of the Savior we hold so dear. Or it should - even we allow tribalism to quietly encroach in our sanctuaries, splitting us between the haves and have nots, the holy ones and those who clearly need to spend more time with Jesus. We hold to our opinions tightly, so tightly, and mask them under a banner of Christianity, waging holy wars on our social media pages and decimating the surrounding peoples not included in our tribe.

So, this year, I decided to do things differently. I am tired of barely making it through a season that is supposed to bring joy to close out the year and catapult me towards Epiphany. I have grown to have a deep love for the liturgical church and practices they model for us all. While some may say that ritual makes our faith dead, I would argue that my life tends to thrive on rhythms. Rhythmically eating well, incorporating physical movement, spending time studying Christ’s Word and meditating bring consistency and peace to me. We are so desperate to prove ourselves faithful and to dwell in the fullness of Christ, that we forsake anything that feels like a ritual. I would argue that it isn’t rituals that are the problem, but our intent behind the practice. In an effort to develop my own new discipline that brings me closer to Christ, I will be celebrating Advent for the first time. If you are like me, and have never celebrated Advent, here is what you need to know. Each week of Advent represents something different, and incorporates physical elements - candles of different colors, an evergreen wreath - that tie back to the meaning of the season. Advent is all about the anticipation of Christ’s birth. You light one candle every week, until finally, all the candles are lit on Christmas Day. The long prophesied birth of the Christ child has finally come to pass!

If this sounds as beautiful to you as it does to me, and you would like to join in celebration of Advent (it begins tomorrow, November 28th), here are some resources for you. At the Church of the City NYC website, you will find a summary explanation of Advent, along with what each of the physical elements represents. There is also a link to sign up for an e-devotional that will pop into your inbox every day to help you celebrate this season. For last minute preppers like myself, you will need to grab five candles - three purple, one pink and one white pillar candle. I got mine from the Family Dollar.

If you are choosing to join me in celebrating Advent this year and waging a war for joy, I would love to hear about it. This year, we are choosing community. We are choosing Christ. Let us choose to behold Him, to bind together, to grab onto joy and never let go.

Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel, praising God and saying, “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests.” Luke 2:13-14

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Nicole Worm is the founder of Redeemed Collective, a recovering perfectionist and is committed to eventually seeing the Atlanta Falcons win a Super Bowl. Also, committed to being dog mom to Bear.