John Marson Dunaway
French & Interdisciplinary Studies
Mercer University
[Dec 19, 2010] —
During the long last weeks of fall semester, I sometimes get a bit bogged down by all the papers to be graded and committee work to be completed … not to mention the rejection notices one often receives from submissions of scholarly work or grant applications.
Sometimes my devotional life too gets similarly caught in the dryness of routine and I’m not sure where to turn for inspiration. Should I start rereading the Psalms? Get a new devotional book? Change my habits of prayer?
Our Redemption Draws Nigh
We are told in Scripture to lift up our heads, to look up, for our redemption is drawing nigh. That is certainly the heart of the Advent message. One of the things about Advent and Christmas that I love the most is that it renews my expectancy about God’s active, albeit hidden participation in my own life and in events all around me.
I’m grateful for the change of seasons that brings me cozy warmth or refreshing coolness, the rebirth of nature in spring, the blazing color of fall, and even the special beauty of the gray bare woods in winter. How much more grateful I am for the “seasons of the soul,” as Christian poet Allen Tate called them: that the dry, arid days of humdrum routine are always followed by the promise of renewal (“Christ in you, the hope of glory”). It’s a reflection of God’s promise of eternal glory with Him that Advent comes in “the bleak midwinter.”
He Is Still At Work
When we’re burdened with the busy-work of grading, committee work, or research, we can remind ourselves that the Holy Spirit is still at work in every aspect of our lives, even in these circumstances of the teaching life. “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.”
Lift up your heads, o ye academic gates, that the King of Glory may come in!
Oh, come, oh, come, Emmanuel!
(c) 2010 John Marson Dunaway Photo copyright flickr user lambertwm
John Marson Dunaway
Professor, French & Interdisciplinary Studies
Mercer University
During the long last weeks of fall semester, I sometimes get a bit bogged down by all the papers to be graded and committee work to be completed … not to mention the rejection notices one often receives from submissions of scholarly work or grant applications.
Sometimes my devotional life too gets similarly caught in the dryness of routine and I’m not sure where to turn for inspiration. Should I start rereading the Psalms? Get a new devotional book? Change my habits of prayer?
We are told in Scripture to lift up our heads, to look up, for our redemption is drawing nigh. That is certainly the heart of the Advent message. One of the things about Advent and Christmas that I love the most is that it renews my expectancy about God’s active, hidden participation in my own life and in events all around me.
I’m grateful for the change of seasons that brings me cozy warmth or refreshing coolness, the rebirth of nature in spring, the blazing color of fall, and even the special beauty of the gray bare woods in winter. How much more grateful am I for the “seasons of the soul,” as Christian poet Allen Tate called them: that the dry, arid days of humdrum routine are always followed by the promise of renewal (“Christ in you, the hope of glory”). It’s a reflection of God’s promise of eternal glory with Him that Advent comes in “the bleak midwinter.”
When we’re burdened with the busy-work of grading, committee work, or research, we can remind ourselves that the Holy Spirit is still at work in every aspect of our lives, even in these circumstances of the teaching life. “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.”
Lift up your heads, o ye academic gates, that the King of Glory may come in!
Oh, come, oh, come, Emmanuel!