If you really want to know what Advent is all about, you really need to go into a primary school and visit the children in primary one and primary two. They just can’t wait for Christmas! They have such a longing in their hearts and are already counting the days…

Advent should be a period of longing for us too. We should try to develop that same sense of hardly being able to wait.

For the children, of course, the wait is for is all the presents of Christmas morning! But for us the wait is for something different – the coming of the Emmanuel – God with us.

We are longing and waiting for God to be part of our lives and to be active in our lives.

If we have a loved one who has been away from home for a while it’s natural that we long to see them return home to be with us.  Advent is like that. It’s a time for us to develop that sense of longing. We feel separated from God but we need to be with God and God needs to be with us.

Soon we will be celebrating Christmas Day and of course the closer we get to Christmas the more the children get excited about what’s going to happen.

As we celebrate the coming of Jesus our Saviour among us may we too be excited that the promised birth of the Saviour is taking place and God is with us.