Advent: How to Actively Wait with Hope
Ready or not, it's here...Christmas is upon us, and with all of it's hustle and bustle is an invitation into the deeper place of Advent. This is a season of waiting...with hope.
Welcome to the 2025 Advent season!
In church tradition, this is a season of re-entering a time of waiting. Advent is a call to remember what it meant for the Jewish people (and though ignorant of their need, the entire world) to wait for a Messiah. This month, I’ll focus weekly on one of the four themes of Advent — Hope, Peace, Joy, and Love.
Advent is a call to remember our wait for a Messiah who came as a baby in a manger, but who will someday return as a conquering King. Don’t pay attention to the conquering King part or even the baby in a manger portion—Advent is about waiting.
How do we wait best? This includes waiting for the return of Jesus, but it also means waiting in line at the grocery store, waiting in traffic, waiting to get into school or a training program, waiting for the right job, or waiting for the person you want to spend your life with.
Sit back for a moment and consider this: In your life, you will always wait on something.
We wait best when we incorporate the themes of Advent into our wait—hope, peace, joy, and love. So, as we look at hope, here are two questions I’ll answer this week:
What does Hope look like?
How do you find Hope in your wait?
HOPE is coming!
Each week of Advent includes four Scripture readings based around the week’s theme—one each from the Old Testament, the Psalms, the New Testament, and the Gospels. This year, the readings come from Isaiah 2, Psalms 122, Romans 13, and Matthew 24. Some of these readings are obvious with their theme of hope, while others are harder to determine, but the global point is that the person of Hope is coming!
For example, Isaiah predicts:
People from many nations will come and say,
“Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,
to the house of Jacob’s God.
There he will teach us his ways,
and we will walk in his paths.”
For the Lord’s teaching will go out from Zion;
his word will go out from Jerusalem.
The Lord will mediate between nations
and will settle international disputes.
They will hammer their swords into plowshares
and their spears into pruning hooks.
Nation will no longer fight against nation,
nor train for war anymore.
-Isaiah 2:3-4
And David proclaims (where the person of Jesus represents Jerusalem):
I was glad when they said to me,
“Let us go to the house of the Lord.”
And now here we are,
standing inside your gates, O Jerusalem.
-Psalms 122:1-2
The Old Testament predicted the coming of Jesus, who would transform the world. All things will be made right—physically, politically, socially, emotionally, etc. There will be rejoicing as we encounter the King in his Kingdom. Yet, we wait. We still look for the total fulfillment of these, but you can be assured that it will take place when Jesus comes again as the conquering King.
The important thing for us to do is to continue to have hope as we wait, as expressed in the New Testament passages. For example, Paul says in Romans:
This is all the more urgent, for you know how late it is; time is running out. Wake up, for our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed. The night is almost gone; the day of salvation will soon be here. So remove your dark deeds like dirty clothes, and put on the shining armor of right living. -Romans 13:11-12
And this is how Jesus explained this in the book of Matthew:
When the Son of Man returns, it will be like it was in Noah’s day. In those days before the flood, the people were enjoying banquets and parties and weddings right up to the time Noah entered his boat. People didn’t realize what was going to happen until the flood came and swept them all away. That is the way it will be when the Son of Man comes. -Matthew 24:37-39
Too often, I’ve read these types of passages with fear (which is the opposite of hope). And yes, there is an element of fear, but for those of us who love Jesus, these are statements of hope—our ultimate salvation is nearer than it ever has been! And as Jesus tells us, we have reason to hope because life will continue to go as normal until Jesus returns.
No one knows the day or hour of Jesus’ return (no matter what they say on social media), so we should make ourselves ready while also going about living our lives. Don’t live in fear! Eat, drink, marry, and be merry, all while you work with intention on the thing(s) which God has called you to do.
Hope Looks Like Jesus
What should be clear is that our hope is in Jesus. He will make the world right. He is what we worship with joy and gladness. He is coming again someday, but until then, we can live our lives with security within His Kingdom. This is what hope looks like.
What this doesn’t tell us, though, is how we actually do it. How do you live a life of Hope as you wait?
How to Wait with HOPE?
Again, each of us is waiting on something. It could be a huge thing, like a medical diagnosis, a job, or a child, or it could be minimal, like a coffee date with a friend or a holiday break. How do you wait in seasons of waiting—big or small?
Here I want to share with you from an Advent devotional and a sermon from one of my professors, Gemma Ryan. Gemma is a wife, mother, spiritual director, and former pastor. She teaches at Friends University and also with John Mark Comer in his Practicing the Way ministry.
In a devotion on Hope pulling from the story of Simeon encountering the Christ child at the Temple (Luke 2:25-34), Gemma gives three ways we find hope in the waiting:
We don’t wait passively.
We are filled with the Spirit as we wait.
We abide with Jesus in the waiting.
1. Be an active wait-er.
In the story of Simeon, he actively goes back and forth from the Temple, expecting to see the Messiah. The image depicts an old man who has sought his Savior throughout his life. This is a beautiful model for us. Our temptation as we wait is to be passive and let life happen to us, but passivity leads to atrophy. The antidote to spiritual atrophy is spiritual activity. Hence, Simeon often visited the Temple expecting to see his Savior.
My youngest child is a senior in high school, and Kia and I are sensing a change in our lives coming. We have no idea what this means (literally, no idea), but we know we need to be active in our waiting. Kia is working hard on her business to grow and improve it. I am back in school to learn more about how we are best spiritually formed. Our hope continues to be in Jesus, but we are waiting for the fulfillment of what he has for us, so we are being active in our wait.
How are you to be active in your current season of waiting?
Be filled with the Spirit.
Luke tells us “the Holy Spirit was on” Simeon, and “the Spirit led him to the Temple” to see the baby Jesus. Again, Simeon was an old man who had been waiting for this gift for many years. It would seem Simeon had the gift of the Spirit for a while, and it allowed him to maintain his hope.
If you want to be full of hope in your wait, you need to be filled with the Spirit…daily.
I write that last sentence with a bit of personal conviction. I don’t ask the Holy Spirit to fill me enough, and I need it. I know that when I feel a sense of hopelessness, the best bit of advice I can give myself is to be filled with the Spirit. When I stop to pray that simple prayer (“Spirit, will you come to fill me today?”), I am filled not just with the Spirit but with hope.
When was the last time you asked the Holy Spirit to fill you?
Have you ever been filled with the Holy Spirit?
Right now, I encourage you to stop and pray to be filled with the Spirit.
Abide with Jesus.
Over the last few months, I’ve read through the Gospel of John several times, and each time I am overwhelmed by Jesus' words on the night of his betrayal. He celebrates what we now know as the Lord’s Supper or Communion, and then he gives his final thoughts to his closest earthly friends. His death is just hours away, and reading the text, you feel his urgency in these comments and answers to his disciples’ questions.
Responding to his friend Phillip, who asked how to see the Father, Jesus replies:
Don’t you believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words I speak are not my own, but my Father who lives in me does his work through me. Just believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me. Or at least believe because of the work you have seen me do. -John 14:10-11
Then, in chapter 15, Jesus calls himself the “true vine” and encourages his friends to “remain in him.”
Anyone who does not remain in me is thrown away like a useless branch and withers. Such branches are gathered into a pile to be burned. But if you remain in me and my words remain in you, you may ask for anything you want, and it will be granted! When you produce much fruit, you are my true disciples. This brings great glory to my Father. -John 15:6-8
How does any of this being in Jesus, remaining/abiding stuff have to do with waiting and hope? One of the Greek words for “wait” is paromeno, and the Greek word for “abide” (another word for remain) is meno. Here is what I want you to see: Your time of waiting is an opportunity to be with Jesus. You can practice being “in Him” as Jesus was in the Father.
What does it look like for you to be with Jesus today?
Hope in the Waiting
The Advent season is the perfect time to reflect on what you are waiting for and how you can find hope in your season of waiting. Of course, Jesus is our hope, but how can you see him as you wait? Be an active wait-er, be filled with the Spirit, and be with Jesus—these are the keys to finding hope this season.
Join the Conversation
I’d love to hear your story or reflection in the comments. What are you waiting on this season, and how are you finding hope?
If this post encouraged you, share it with someone who could use a reminder that hope still lives.
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Thank you for this Andy,good stuff.