The first Sunday of Advent came and went yesterday and well, I’m still thinking about hope. Hope is lingering longer these days. Like a friend who puts their hand on the front door to leave and suddenly your eyes meet, “FIVE MORE MINUTES?!”, and you jump right back in where you left off. It feels sweet today, especially at the end of an unexpectedly good year.
The end of the year has historically been a season where I feel the shame of not doing enough, preparing enough, having enough, considering enough, donating enough. The scarcity mindset I try to keep at bay all year catches up to me, and see Advent as the time to gulp down as much as I can. Those four Sundays leading up to Christmas tempt me to hoard as much hope, peace, joy and love as possible.
Today, Advent is not triggering a mentality of scarcity. I am curiously engaging with an Advent where I don’t have to take it all to ration through the next year, I don’t have to compete for the most special Christmas ever, I don’t have to “find” hope… but accept it.
This year, many doors I walked through scared me, and carried grief, but on the other side there has been an abundant and overwhelming amount of air to breathe. Big decisions, deep work, and a long sabbatical have cleared my heart in a way I wasn’t sure was possible. With this perspective, I’m in a state of noticing, romanticizing, and enjoying. For the first time in a long time, I feel like I have enough.
I can almost pinpoint the moment my heart finally shifted away from scarcity, and it all started with a taco run, as most good things do. It was Summer, but for some reason I was thinking about Advent. I wondered what it would feel like on the other side of the year, and dreamed of some future clarity I'd have, answers to all of the outstanding questions. As I pulled into the parking lot of our beloved Veracruz tacos (and all the Austinites say AMEN), the words appeared, like a light switch in my heart. They didn’t exist, and then they did plain as day:
“Hope is food”.
At first I thought maybe I was so hungry that I was coming up with a taco related mantra. But I could not shake the words. As I pondered them throughout the day, I let my inner cynic rip the words apart. Even still, I couldn’t help but revel in the notion of what we inch towards during Advent.
A starving world, full of food, in need of something more.
The Bible is full of references to food, Jesus feeds people and then offers himself as the Bread of Life. But for me, the concept of hope as food pointed to the fact that yes, I believe that true Hope sustains me forever. And also, sometimes I don’t feel sustained by it at all. Like in the regular annoying moments, when I run my car over my brand new phone, lose my temper at the screaming backseat, or step on a Cheerio-AGAIN. Or the harder moments, my forehead against the steering wheel as I cry because I just want to take my sweet kid to a birthday party without fearing for her life. In these snapshots of time, it’s not even that hope feels far, but almost irrelevant? In fact, I feel like I have to sustain the hope all on my own.
“Hope is food”, somehow cut through the very real noise in my life. I thought, you know, air feels irrelevant, too. Yet, I can’t deal with the present moment without it. Thinking of hope as fuel for today… that feels (I’m sorry) digestible. A perfect bite. Of course, I will notice my hunger more in certain seasons than others, but I can’t possibly satisfy my hunger forever in one sitting. I can, however, tolerate the hard moments with much more grace and enjoyment when I am not hangry.
This moment, this blink of time, is something I have come back to nearly every day since. When I feel the ever present temptation to blanket my life in hope, I remember simply- I don’t need ALL the hope. I just need enough until my next “meal”. Just enough for today.
If I can believe that hope is food for my soul. It means hope isn't silly or naive, it’s nourishing. It means hope sustains me, not the other way around. It means I can use it all, and trust that there’s more coming. I find great comfort today taking hope off the high shelf, like something precious and breakable I acquired. While it is precious, it’s not rare. It’s not a gift received only once, but over and over, and over.
It’s unmatched and accessible.
And the more I settle into Advent, the more tender my heart feels at the true accessibility of hope for us all. A baby born amongst no real walls. Fully interdependent with a real human mom- her body sustaining Him with food, His body responding as hope for her world.
I’m not in charge of providing hope, or sustaining it. But I do get to partake. Sometimes, especially in this season of life, my only participation is remembering, and forgetting, and remembering, and forgetting. And every time I get to the end of hope, like Divine clockwork, there’s more hope waiting for me.
God gives a hand to those down on their luck,
gives a fresh start to those ready to quit.
All eyes are on you, expectant;
you give them their meals on time.
Psalm 145:14-15
God, I am setting the table, and lighting the candle. I’m here to eat, to feast on hope over and over. I’m here to lose perspective, and find it again. I’m here for the hope sparked by new ideas, new babies, and old dreams. I’m here to see you in all of it. I won’t be scared to run out, because there is no scarcity of hope. Oh, let hope linger! Let it visit, and stay awhile.
Amen