Hope, Love, Joy, and Peace

Many of you have been working your way through the four weeks of Advent by lighting candles in an Advent wreath.  The candles:  Hope, Love, Joy, Peace all speak into the experience of Christmas and the cosmic implications that Christ's birth has had on the story of God's restoration plan for creation.

These candle themes have such far-reaching effects if we take seriously the depth and breadth of Christ's reign and the impact of His coming.  As we move through advent, I've caught myself often considering each of these themes in the lives of the students at Covenant as they move through their educational journey.

If we are a school that is redeemed by the coming of Christ and operates from this assumption, it would hold that our students would experience this daily and weekly as well.  Following are just a few (of hundreds!!!) ways in which I've experienced the advent themes recently.... perhaps you can think of your own experiences as well!!

Hope:  a student, after diligent and hard work hopes that they understand enough to begin the next task, and that their work will come together as they have imagined.  a teacher sits in anticipation as a student struggles to read aloud a passage they have worked so hard to master.

Love:  a older student stops their game to attend to another who has fallen... dusts them off and sends them on to play.  a teacher exercises persistence and patience with a student who is angry and frustrated and wants to give up.

Joy:  a group of students chooses an optional recess inside to prepare for an upcoming activity they are excited to get started on.  a teacher, after much preparation, launches into a cross-grade activity to introduce students to something outside of their normal experience to product creative and high quality work.

Peace:  two students find a way to work together to solve a problem rather than fighting.  a teacher enjoys a moment of calm in their classroom following the restoration of a broken friendship.

A principal continues to marvel at how celebrating Christ's birth continues to seem new and marvelous each year again, and how so often hope, love, joy, peace work and weave their way through this place.  

We must be plugged in... "... for apart from me, you can do nothing..." John 15:5

Advent Season

And we wait.  I was sharing with some students this morning that by this time last year, we had had three snow storms already.  Winter seems to be taking its time to arrive, and there are mixed emotions about this.  We are certainly enjoying the warm temperatures outside, but there is a longing for what is coming.  We have seen evidence of the seasons changing over, but winter just doesn't seem to arrive.  

That sense of anticipation and waiting is an important concept to teach to our children in the Advent season.  Much of our culture convinces us that waiting is not worth it.  Not having something NOW is unfortunate, and that we deserve immediate gratification.  The chosen nation of Israel waited so long for their Messiah.  In faith, they remained.. and often they got it wrong.  Scripture makes a point, it seems, at the fact that the Messiah's coming did not depend on whether Israel got it right, but that they were continually called back to faithfulness to God.  They were being prepared for the coming of a King.

In this season of 'already - not yet', in which we know Christ has come and paid our debt of sin, and that He will return to bring heaven to earth, we also wait.  We too, often get it wrong in our waiting, but are continually called back to faithfulness to God as we wait...

We wait for winter and the fun and excitement the snow will bring.  We wait for Christmas and the celebration we will enjoy.  We wait for justice and peace in a world struck with conflict.  We wait for Christ's return and the redemption of the world.  In our advent this season, and in the longing for Christ's return, we too are being prepared for the coming of the King!!  

Together, with David (Psalm 72:8)  we cry "May he rule from sea to sea and from the River to the ends of the earth."  and with John from Revelation: "Come, Lord Jesus!"  Rev 22:20  Until then, we wait and strive to live as children of light.