Spiritual Seasons: Advent w/ Hannah Sorota

Enjoy this guest post from Hannah Sorota!

The church now enters Advent: our season of expectation. It is another season that teaches us about waiting. It is a season of anticipation and hope, in which we long for the coming of Christ.

Be honest. Is that what’s on your mind right now?

Are you excited for this season, looking forward to Christmas, but feeling pressured by your to-do list? Are you hassled because the days have started passing too quickly for you to get it all done in time? Annoyed because you’ll be spending time with extended family members who stress you out? Already tired of the Christmas music playing everywhere? Cynical of the culture’s materialism – and then unhappy because you see it in your own kids, and even more in yourself?

We all love Christmas, but most people are weary of the madness by December 26th. We all have that madness in our lives this season of the year: another get-together, your son’s band concert, your daughter’s dance recital, your husband’s company party and the church ladies’ Christmas Tea; decorating the house, putting up the lights, shopping for deals, traveling, hosting the open house, finding those stocking stuffers; the family coming to visit, more presents to wrap, more presents to buy, more baking to do. Always MORE!

Seasons: Extra/Ordinary

We've looked at Moses the last few weeks, at the many spiritual seasons of his life.  This week we'll take a look at his most ordinary/extraordinary time of life.  Does that sound familiar?  Extra/Ordinary?

God finds a man who shares his holy anger over Israel's slavery.  God sends that man out to a desert where his anger can be molded, refined and where rescuing skills are learned.  Then it's time, and God sends Moses back to Egypt.

You probably know the story: miracles, plagues, staffs that become snakes, a Hebrew man who speaks for the living God, a Pharaoh who finally says "Go", an Israelite hoard followed by an Egyptian army, a pillar of fire, a parted sea.

Extraordinary.

Seasons: Waiting and Preparation

We left Moses after he murdered an Egyptian.  As the story continues Pharaoh hears of the murder and tries to seize Moses and kill him for murdering an Egyptian.  To save his skin, Moses flees to Midian.

While a sin with life-long consequences, I suggested that Moses' life up to this point was a season in which God fashioned a man who would share his passion for the Israelites and share God's anger at their slavery.

But that wasn't enough.  Rarely is.

Seasons: Moses: Get Angry.

What spiritual season are you in? Did Saul's time in Egypt resonate with where you are? If not, maybe Moses is your guy. His story is written in chunks of very obvious seasons.

Walk like an Egyptian

Moses spent his childhood and adolescent years living in Pharaoh's house as an adopted son. If you know what's in store for him,  you see some obvious pluses, such as: later, when God tells Moses "go to Pharoah and say..." Moses will actually know how to go to Pharaoh. I mean, it might seem silly, but doesn't knowing what door to enter, what floor Pharaoh's throne room is on, how many steps to the podium, which person can notify the man in charge that you've arrived, where to park your camel - doesn't knowing all of those practical things remove a whole layer of fear regarding  "go to Pharaoh and say"?

Ready. Set. Go! ...to Arabia

We're thinking through spiritual seasons: chunks of time that serve specific spiritual purposes.  These seasons are not to be confused with pumpkin latte season.  That's where the spiritual discipline aspect of it comes into play.  We are often more willingly engulfed by the seasonal wares of the mass-market than by the spiritual seasons tenderly executed in our lives by the living God.

God may have you in a season of simplicity, trying to drive a few basic points home, trying to help you discover simplistic acts of worship and the simplicity of His love for you, but you will stop by Target and load up a cart with fall junk, make an impossible must-accomplish list, sign your kids up for that extra activity no one has time for, dive into a new friendship because you'll feel guilty if you don't make plans, and on and on.  God may have you in a season of loneliness - on purpose! - gasp! Perhaps He is trying to teach you to rely on Him alone.  Perhaps He is trying to correct false expectations in relationship, or to fashion you into a better friend.  Regardless, you'll fight against this season by joining a few dozen chat rooms, hammering down a friendship door that's been closed, insisting the problem isn't you and talking the ear off your barista while she's frantically trying to make ten pumpkin lattes simultaneously.  (Side note - What is it with the pumpkin latte?  Is there no other flavor of fall?!)

Spiritual Seasons

Slowly, I'm working my way through spiritual disciplines I usually shove aside, bury in a busy schedule, or simply ignore.  Disciplines that often slip our minds and rarely find their way into our routines.

Sabbath
Solitude
Seasons
Service

We've spent the last few weeks discovering how to keep an urban Sabbath.  Did you miss it?  Check it out here. Hopefully, we've learned what Sabbath is and what it isn't.  Hopefully we've enjoyed some best of the best.  Hopefully, we've started making some good.

I debated where to go next (in order?) and decided to tackle Seasons BEFORE we get into all the holiday stuff so that maybe we're a bit more prepared to handle them.  Plus, Seasons doesn't necessarily have anything to do with holidays - as we'll see, and I didn't want it to get murky.

Where did the swimsuits go?

September is almost here.  Did you hear me?  September is almost here!  Agh!!!!!  Not ready.  Not nearly ready.  Our summer was a mix of quick-unpack-now-repack interrupted by change-the-sheets-the-company-is-here pandaemonium.  The cabinet door that broke in June is still broken.  The laundry pile is belly-button high.  My nightstand is littered with quarters, stray buttons, clothes that need mending, single earrings and half-finished crafts (you know, the kind you start because you think you have a free day and then you remember you have to go to the dmv, so you hunt down your sleeping bag because who knows how long that's going to take).

I'm not ready.  I have not made a new life schedule.  I haven't even started my summer reading list because I'm still reading the book I started in March.  Yes, March.  I haven't made a menu plan.  Mail is piled up on my desk.  Lucy still thinks her nose is inside her ear because we didn't study biology this summer, and pinterest is already displaying Thanksgiving crafts (can we all just agree not to pin those yet?!).  My ideal life is not in place yet!  September cannot come - and yet, it will.