Advent "Non-Doing"

A couple of days ago, the first real snowfall of the year made its way through southern Ontario.  At my present location there is a vast open field behind the building, with grass, trees and some flower gardens.  As I walked past a rather wide window and looked out on the entire scene covered in a blanket of snow, I just said to myself, "Now it's Advent!"  What did I mean by that?  Well certainly there is very much an association with snow in my mind with this time of year, coming from Montreal originally, we know what real snow is.  As I reflected further on my own exclamation, there is a good connection between snow and what the season of Advent is really all about.  When snow is covering the ground, all of creation is asleep, waiting.  Plants and trees are not growing, they are dormant, storing up energy for the spring time when they will bud forth into new life.  Advent is about waiting, and it is about not doing.  Out in the consumer world, the time leading up to Christmas is about anything but not doing, it's about endless shopping, and "holiday" parties, to the point where Christmas just becomes an anti-climax, as we collapse exhausted after the pre-Christmas hustle and bustle.  Perhaps we can take a clue from God's creation around us, as it waits calmly, serenely, patiently, and quietly for the coming spring, so we in this holy season of preparation are invited to wait in the quiet of our hearts and homes for the coming of our Saviour.  This Advent let's pull back from the doing, and enter a bit more into the being, the patient and quiet waiting for the springtime of our Saviour's arrival.