Being Present

It feels like we've spent the last couple of years looking to the future, waiting for the end of this pandemic. Waiting for some time when things will feel "normal" again. And that time doesn't really seem to get much closer.

In the church, we are in the season of Advent. It is a time of waiting expectantly for Jesus' birth, and for "the fullness of time" to arrive, when it will at last be on earth as it is in heaven. So we should be used to this kind of waiting.

But the waiting seems to be piling on. We can feel like we're stuck on hold, or in a holding pattern. And we can forget that real life is happening right now, in the midst of the waiting. It is what we do while we are waiting that is life.

I am grateful for this otter this morning, who is intent on eating and doesn't seem frustrated with the relentless waves. Eat, dive, float. This otter is not waiting for the waves to calm. It is not swimming beyond the breakers in search of calmer waters. It reminds me that this moment is what we are in. And this one. And this one.

And so rather than focus on what I don't have, what I can't do (yet), rather than feeling like now isn't enough because some imagined future will be better, I was able this morning to remember what I do have, right now. I've been vaccinated and boosted (thanks, science!) and so has my family. We can gather for Christmas, and even welcome friends! We can bake cookies and sing carols and watch sappy Christmas movies together. We can laugh and play games and decorate the tree. We can go outside and see the wonders of creation. We can watch sunrises, and sunsets, and marvel at the moon and stars. Each moment is enough.

Being present in the present makes the waiting easier.