How to Rest in God this Advent

Join me for a 16 day Advent journey with devotionals and Handel’s Messiah.

Yes, please. I’d like to join the Advent journey.

Advent is on its way along with the busyness of the pre-Christmas season. Even as the church interprets Advent as a second Lent, a time of quiet, self-awareness, and confession, the world around us ups the anty on its marketing campaigns. Quiet feels impossible. The weeks are filled with holiday traditions, established expectations, and gift lists. As a mom of three, I often enter this season exhausted even before it’s begun. 

Advent takes intentionality. We make space to hold out our longing for God’s embodied presence, to prepare for Christmas, and to get our hearts ready for his coming again.

And this year, at the end of 2020, all I feel like doing is gazing on the brilliance of Christ and listening to the music of the throne room.

In the Wim Wenders 1987 film, The Sky over Berlin or Wings of Desire in the English adaptation, you see angels in winter overcoats in East Berlin’s urban library, doing one of two things, either leaning into the thoughts of a human, empathizing with a hand on a shoulder or a head leaning against their head interceding, or ears open to the music in the throne room of God. As these angels listen to the celestial choir, their eyes close. A smile awakens on their face. They are with the Almighty at rest. At worship. They are remembering who and whose they are. At dawn and then again at dusk, they meet on the tops of buildings to watch the sunrise and again, to listen to the music around the throne room. I want more of that this Advent.

Click here to watch the library scene.

For years my Advent consisted of singing for the Calvin Alumni choir and performing with over 100 other singers on the DeVoss Performance Hall stage behind the Grand Rapids symphony orchestra. The music wound its way through each November and December: “For unto us a child is born” and “I know my Redeemer Liveth” and the 4 and a half minutes of Amens. When we got to “The Trumpet shall sound” and “Worthy is the Lamb that was Slain” it was hard to keep my hands wrapped around my score. I wanted to raise my arms.

We’re in the dusk of a year. A hard year of heightened anxiety. Spending time with Handel’s Music feels like a beautiful invitation. To rest in worship. To gaze on the Messiah. To be reenergized remembering who and whose we are.

This year I’ve put together a 16-piece devotional series that can be delivered to your inbox December 1-16. Visit my website, summerjoygross.com to find out more.

Today I’m giving you a preview with one of the episodes right here: a devotional with the bookends of the tenor solo, Comfort Ye from Isaiah 40. Begin listening at 4:38.

Click here to gaze on the light of Christ with Summer this Advent.