Most years, Advent feels like the bustle and excitement of an airport. Bags packed, tickets in hand, we’re striding through the concourse with glimpses of planes through every window, ready to go.
But this year, I wonder if Advent feels more like the sound of a distant plane, heard, perhaps, through the vent of a bathroom in a Doha jail? The sound of longing, not sure what we long for?
Before incarceration, I never listened for planes. Walking through the airport, there’s too much going on, too much to see, to smell, to hear— announcements reminding us to keep our bags with us at all times, last calls for gates, the sound of luggage bumping through a scanner, the smell of coffee, the long line in front of Starbucks; I pass high windows, planes rolling into place, moving sidewalks, and I look for my gate, ready to go.
But when I lost the freedom to go to an airport, to get on a plane, and to go home, I heard planes differently.
I heard their language of yearning and hope.
I recall moments inside when I lingered in the bathroom stall, above a squat toilet, lifting up my head toward the vent to listen. A plane. Taking off. I longed for—what did I long for? Not the plane. Was it for family? For sunlight? Freedom? Home? Peace? I don’t know. I responded to the song of the plane with a longing I could not fully understand.
The night we got out, we stayed at a hotel near the airport. In the evening, I stood at the hotel promontory to be alone, to think, to wonder, to grieve, to let the events of the previous day, of the previous year, rise and fall like angry waves held back too long. I was out, but I could not go home yet.
Then planes began to take off, flying over the promontory one after another, so close I could see their white bellies and blinking wing lights, so close I might touch them, and yet so far. They thundered into the evening sky and disappeared with a lingering roar. I stayed until it grew dark, until a security guard interrupted my solace.
And for the year afterwards, when we were not allowed to go home, when we hugged our kids over Skype every night, the planes played the soundtrack of my longing. At sunset, I would be sitting at the kitchen table with a laptop propped on a shoebox, homeschooling my boys, and the planes would begin their evening song. Engines roared to life. I could imagine their heat waves shimmering in the dusk, enveloping a watery plane before it takes off over the desert sands.
So close. But so far away.
Longing.
What are you longing for this season?
Are you longing for travel and for family gatherings? For hugs and real parties? Or simply for the familiar—for Christmas traditions and holiday music in the malls, for candlelight services and cookie exchanges?
Advent, perhaps, is leaning into that longing, and letting our longings lead us to the manger.
We ache with wonder and hunger for Jesus--born among us, and we miss him.
We ache with anticipation and desperation for the day when He will make all things right.
We ache with delight and despair because Christmas has room for both—for sleeping in the manger and stumbling to the cross; for shepherds rejoicing and Rachel weeping; for peace on earth good will to men and the Son who must learn death; for a promise kept and a promise that will be kept.
We celebrate.
And we wait.
But we wait with Hope—
Hard and lovely hope,
bitter sorrow mingled with sweet peace,
a lonely Presence interrupting our utter alone-ness,
a wailing, hungry Christ child,
the promise of Mary’s heart pierced,
joy to the world,
dwelling among us,
all there,
somehow.
That moment,
like the sound of a plane in the dark sky.
Could the pandemic change the way we hear Christmas?
Let us lean in. Let us long for Jesus with abandon, because he has promised to satisfy—and satisfy fully.
Let us strain our ears to hear…
Jesus, further than we can bear, nearer than we dreamed possible—
Jesus, here and coming,
Christ in us, the hope of glory.
Merry Christmas.