Week 2: Preparation for Joy
by Katie Harding on December 6, 2021
In reading the book RARE Leadership in the Workplace, I learned that our brains run on two kinds of fuel: joy and fear. Although the fuel of joy is what our brains crave, without realizing it, our brains can be so fueled by fear that we have to literally start cultivating a life of joy if we want to counter the fear. To do this, the authors recommend we allow ourselves six days, twice a day, for five minutes at a time, to reflect on appreciation to make the shift from one attitude to the other.
John the Baptist could also be considered an attitude-shifter, one who would turn back many in Israel to the Lord their God. He was sent as the forerunner to Christ, in the spirit and power of Elijah, to reconcile familial relationships and to help people shift their attitudes from one of disobedience to righteousness. His mission was to “make ready a people prepared for the Lord.”
The act of turning back is one of repentance. To repent is to turn away from something to turn to something else. When we repent before the Lord, we turn away from disobedience to turn toward obedience. John the Baptist prepared people for the Lord’s coming by calling them to a baptism of repentance.
For us, too, preparation is often about the act of repentance. It’s about doing a thorough housecleaning within the chambers of our heart. Surveying our bad habits and working to develop good habits in their place. It’s about picking up the rug and dealing with the particles of dirt that have accumulated there. Housecleaning is not always fun, but it’s necessary if we are going to prepare ourselves for the coming of the Christ.
Advent is a season of waiting, but waiting doesn’t mean just sitting doing nothing. As I have learned over the years, servers in restaurants, formerly called waiters, actually keep very busy while they wait for the arrival of their next guests. They are busy cleaning up and clearing out. They are refilling containers and resetting tables to their original state. Waiting is a time for preparing.
So during this Advent season, while we are experiencing a time of waiting, let us also get busy and be about preparing. In the same way John the Baptist prepared people through an act of repentance, let us prepare ourselves. Let us tend to the chambers of our hearts and do our own cleaning up and clearing out. Let us prepare for the coming celebration of the birth of the Messiah — Christ Jesus our Lord. Let us begin now the Preparation for Joy!