Advent: Hope Candle

November 30th.

The first Sunday of Advent is an interesting one, and I am reminded with a sort of gentle force that there are no easy answers. That we are waiting. Lighting the Hope candle, even while we read passages of prophecy - confession and lament.

Looking to a better day to come.

Reminded that it is okay to be mixed up and muddled and watching grief play in their eyes, to create a safe space and allow them to begin to name it. That actions sometimes communicate louder than words. And, that time is precious.

Because, one of my fifth graders comes spilling over with half formed words about a family hurt. One of them whispers questions about sin and grace and mental illness that I can't help but answer, even while the presenter continues to talk. All of them clasp hands and elbows - and occasionally fall full to the ground - working through team building challenges while we read the verse.

"For I am convinced that...nothing has the power to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord."

Over and over again. Until church is suddenly out 10-15 minutes early. And, we're weaving through bodies to find a lost Bible. And, it doesn't matter what else we had planned. Because, time is up.

But, time is also a gift.

An in between services that stretches long and gives us precious time to connect. To watch them play in the octagon until they are stumbling with exhaustion. To verbally pull in the ones who have been hesitant lately, too busy trying to find the fuzzy eighth grade line between grown-up and still-little. To laugh with them and have nonsensical conversations and make sure that they are seen. To talk and be and let them slip my spare name tag around their neck, where it will stay for the rest of the service.

Because, when my name is on one side and theirs is stuck to the other, it doesn't matter so much who is claiming who. It's Advent, and we're doing this together.

Slipping into leaders' meetings and back out again. Sitting behind the octagon to talk. Jumping in to play. Being body slammed by a slight seventh grader who hasn't been here for months, his everything coming a hundred miles an hour, and my name tag almost instantly over his head.

So that there are two extras of "me" wandering around this crowd of middle schoolers and a half dozen stray tags littering my actual back.

Game time, where we Google on someone else's phone, because one of the sixth grade girls is playing with mine. Where we take turns following the ones most likely to know the answer, and the girls who spent so many hours notebooking with me last year clump up during the Bible questions, instinctively sure that someone has the answer buried in their heads. That I know, even if they don't.

Music. Lesson. Filtering back to the places where we 'always' sit, as if there was a magnetic pull to this habit, a silent need to be close. Together.

Goofy at first, in that manic sort of way that means trying to forget, trying not to think about it, like an over tired two year old running wild lest they find themselves suddenly asleep. 

Sometimes, they don't need words to say what they want to say. Sometimes I am paying enough attention to do goofy when they need to. To know when to make eye contact and when to acknowledge their sassy comments. To let them peel the extra names off my back and to sit quietly when the talk gets hard and there are silent tears that don't quite fall from eighth grade eyes.

Because, there is unspoken grief here, even when the girls use breakout groups to begin to put words to it.

"Hold on, it get's better."

"Hold On Pain Ends: H.O.P.E."

"Jesus went through greater suffering than we have, and He knows what it's like."

They stay close when they need to feel safe. Wear my tags and chase each other across the giant room. Relax a little every time someone teasingly calls them by my name. Body slam and then slow until I can catch them. Stay until little sisters are fidgeting with impatience to go home.

Not because I am magic or because this place is, but because this is what we do with our heavenly Father.

We pull close. Slip the identity of Christ around our necks. Call each other by this name, 'Christian,' a thousand times over, until we begin to remember. Throw ourselves into Divine Grace and slow just enough to see it slip into the in betweens. Stay and wait, even when the world around us fidgets with the impatience to just 'make it better already.'

Wait for the already, not yet coming of the Christ. The Redeemer. Rescuer.

Hope in the midst of lament.