Good morning! It is a beautiful start to the Advent season! I am Rev. Katherine Wright, the new Assistant Chaplain and Disciples on Campus Minister at TCU. I am excited to walk with you on this Advent season with our devotionals this year. We will have three devotionals a week from all over the TCU community. I hope that you can take a moment upon recieving these to sit in a moment with the spirit of God. I wish you all the hope, peace, joy, and love this season has to offer.
Isaiah 9:2-7
2 The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who lived in a land of deep darkness—on them light has shined.
3 You have multiplied exultation; you have increased its joy; they rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest, as people exult when dividing plunder.
4 For the yoke of their burden and the bar across their shoulders, the rod of their oppressor,
you have broken as on the day of Midian.
5 For all the boots of the tramping warriors and all the garments rolled in blood shall be burned as fuel for the fire.
6 For a child has been born for us, a son given to us; authority rests upon his shoulders, and he is named Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
7 Great will be his authority, and there shall be endless peace for the throne of David and his kingdom. He will establish and uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time onward and forevermore. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this.
Reflection
I don’t know what kind of darkness you might be walking in—darkness of grief, sadness, loss, debt, it sounds completely overwhelming. We hear the phrase “Light at the end of the tunnel” so often that it has lost meaning. But what I hope for you is hope. Hope that there is a light, even when you can’t see it. Hope there is an end to what feels like you are buried in.
Hope isn’t something that comes natural to me, it is something that requires practice. Just like practicing something over and over until it becomes natural, hope takes practice. Hope in knowing you will feel normal again, hope in feeling happy again, hope in knowing there is goodness to be anticipated.
This passage from Isaiah is from the Hebrew Bible or the Old Testament. It is one of the passages us modern-day Christians use to foresee our Savior coming. No one expected him to be a tiny, itty-bitty baby born in a barn and laid in a feed trough (sometimes we forget that’s what a manger really is). Even then, even defying expectations, we know he was everything we’d hoped he’d be—Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
My prayer for you is centered on hope. Hope rooted in peace, joy, and love in our Creator and our Redeemer. We may not always be able to see what’s coming, but we have hope that it will.
Let us pray.
Almighty God, we find ourselves at the beginning of a journey of anticipation. We know what is to come, that is the birth of your Son. We know all the goodness that was shone in his birth comes from you. Share that goodness with us when we are lost, afraid, and in deep darkness. Though I walk in darkness, O Lord, I will not be afraid—for I know that the morning will come, and the great light of your glory will shine all around me; through Jesus, the light of the world. Amen.