Advent: An Invitation to Remove Obstacles to the Divine
…So many of the narratives of Christmas resound with this theme. They depict people who are either ready for the arrival of Emmanuel (“God with us”) or those like Herod, who are so opposed to that arrival that they make craven efforts to stop it. They depict people like the prophets Simeon and Anna in the Temple, who recognized immediately that Jesus was the awaited one; and the wise men, who recognized Jesus’ world-changing importance. The whole point of Advent is a time of preparation for Jesus’ arrival into our own hearts and lives. How can we bring down obstacles we erect between ourselves and God? How can we remove the mountains and make the paths level and clear? This, at its heart, is what Advent asks of us. {Read entire article on Patheos HERE.}