Announcing: the weight of waiting

An Advent series.

I promise you I didn’t plan this. Truly, I’m sniffling in Starbucks as I write this sentence, bands of pink stretching across the sky outside the large window ahead, the sun setting as tears threaten to fall. For actual months, I’ve wrestled with writing out this series… well, no, that’s not fully true. Writing it isn’t the problem. The time, the energy needed, the health capacity that is so limited now and the extra margin needed to put this together… yes, that’s where I’ve gone back and forth.

After writing/creating/sending a Holy Week email series called “here, in the week of it all”, requests for an Advent email series began to appear in my inbox. Little did you know I already had a title and a theme and a desire to put it together for you, for me, for all of us navigating another season of so much.

Yes, I mean the gatherings and the gifts, the holly and the tinsel, the holiday parties and the end of the year work rush. But also the grief and the darkness that creeps into the day at 4:25pm. The long drives home and the evenings alone, the extra-full calendars and the end of the year reflections and future unknowns. The joy of the season and the sadness that there’s so much going on that we might miss it even as we live it. The truth that even as we celebrate His arrival, we are still navigating our own season of waiting, waiting, waiting.

Every time I write about waiting, you write your own “me too’s.” Our stories are different, but the weight of waiting is universal, and I couldn’t shake the idea of leaning into this tension-filled theme right. now.

Advent: coming. arrival. appearance. expectation. anticipation.

Wait: stay. remain. delay. pause. stop.

But then there’s this, a combo of the two, right there from Merriam-Webster: “waiting — to remain stationary in readiness or expectation, to look forward expectantly”

The bubblegum pink clouds have disappeared and the sky is a blue so deep that as I glance up at the window, I’m met with my own reflection staring back, tired but glassy eyes, a small smile tugging at the corners of my mouth.

My head is pounding, the weekly migraine doing no favors, and I know that there are more than enough reasons to say no to this for now, to say maybe next year, to hope that my health will shift in 2025 and my bandwidth will increase and I’ll have so much margin that the entire series is ready by September instead of written in the most real of real time. There would be absolutely nothing, not one thing, wrong with that decision. In a season of More More More, in a body that reached its limits a long time ago, the more I’m interested in is more rest, more answered prayers, more manna. And yet — despite a dozen valid and logical reasons, this won’t let go of me. Maybe… maybe because of the valid and logical reasons. Maybe… because I’m carrying the weight of the long wait. Maybe… because you are too. Maybe… because there’s a wild tension in daring to declare joy to the world while navigating the silence of a dark night. Maybe… because that’s exactly where we’ll find Him. Breaking into the silence with the vulnerable cry of a little one. Showing up in our grief, in our confusion, in every waiting room. Keeping His Word even when it doesn't make sense, doesn't seem to add up, seems to be taking so very, very long.

The sky is a deep, seemingly endless dark. I’m squinting at the screen and wishing, hoping, praying the pounding away. But I’m also blinking back tears as I re-read the words that introduced “here, in the week of it all”. Somehow they work, all these months later, and honestly I shouldn’t be surprised at this point because the seasons change but God, thank God, remains. Holy Week, Ordinary Time, Advent—in all of it, His goodness and faithfulness are the thread running through, so yeah, of course He knew then what I’m only glimpsing now.

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From the Introduction of “here, in the week of it all” —

There are many who say it’s best to wait until you’re on the other side before you write the story, before you say the words, before you tell what happened. There’s wisdom in that, but if I’m honest, when I’m in a middle place I don’t only need to hear from those a chapter or two ahead… I need to know I’m not alone on this page.⁣

Here, in a middle place.

Here, in the in between, holding both the grief of Good Friday and the joy of Easter morning.⁣

Here, one full year after writing “Easter has passed and I'm still waiting on a miracle.”

Here… still… waiting.

Still watching. Still hoping. Still getting angry. Still working to forgive.

I’m still learning to rejoice in the ruins and sing in the shadows.

I’ve been split wide, knife in the back, tears rushing like a faucet with a broken knob. This time of year holds memories stretching back to childhood, but it’s the more recent ones that bring me to my knees, the pattern of the rug temporarily indented on my skin. Sometimes the calendar says Spring and life says “huh, maybe next year.” Sometimes Winter lingers long after the ice melts, the flowers bloom, and the birds begin to chirp from limbs that are filling once again.

Sometimes our hearts break right alongside the seeds splitting open, new life pushing up from the depths while our own world shifts, flips, turns a direction we never saw coming.

If I’m being brutally honest, I hate what these days hold. All who know, and the knowers are few but they’re true, say there’s no understanding it, no way to make much sense of it, except to hand the muchness of it all over to the One who holds these days, too.

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This Spring, I invited you to join me in the mess and the muchness and the both/and of a brutal and beautiful week. Nearly 20,000 words later, the series ended with this:

“Our eyes may be clouded with tears, our mind full of questions and our hands full of worries, but we are invited to show up exactly as we are. Come when it’s dark and you don’t know where else to go. Come with your grief, your doubt, your confusion and fears. Jesus won’t run away; He won’t disappear. Instead, He comes close. He meets us in the muchness, sees us in our sadness, and promises to turn every grave into a garden.

Hope, broken and buried like a seed.

Hope, alive and breathing and calling our name.

Hope, even now turning every Friday Good.

What a day. What a sacrifice. What a gift. What a love. What a friend.

Emmanuel, God with us.⁣

Here.

Now.

Always.”

Now it’s November, Advent just a few days away, and I’m in tears at the realization that it began with the words “here… still… waiting” and literally ends with how God is “Here. Now. Always.” and I promise you, pinky promise you, that I didn’t plan that, didn’t even catch that, until tonight.

I also didn’t catch, until this actual moment, the coincidental wild and beautiful and unexpected¹ connection between Holy Week and Advent right here in this October (Ordinary Time) post. After months of the Advent series name sneaking into my thoughts, I purposely slipped it into a post. Maybe I’d be able to write the series, maybe it would need to be paused until 2025, but the phrase wouldn’t let me go so I let it go. I just didn’t realize the call-back, didn’t remember that the Holy Week series wrapped up with words about hope like a seed, until . . . right now.

(It’s stuff like this that stuns me, that I can’t explain and will never get over. Why the God of the actual universe cares so kindly about even the little details, down to a tiny phrase, is beyond me, but it’s astounding and I suppose He knows I’m a details gal who will feel seen in the small ‘you didn’t have to do this, but you chose to anyway’ things.)

And so, yeah, I’m going to trust the manna will multiply over these next few weeks, enough for a real-time right now Advent series that carries the name that arrived this summer and then refused to leave.

Introducing . . . an Advent email series called:

the weight of waiting

Each Sunday of the Advent season (beginning this coming Sunday!), I’ll send an email with a reflection, a song to sit with, a verse to meditate on, and a brand new phone lock screen.

There will be fresh pieces as well as previously published Advent/waiting writings, all strung together, a mix of old and new reflections on the truth that holds true.

This Advent email series will go out to everyone who is subscribed to All The Things. Instead of creating a PDF ebook that’s available to download for $15+ with a fancy sales page and check-out platform, I’m keeping it simple (and less $) by including this within All The Things. You can upgrade your subscription below and cancel immediately after Christmas—or stick around for extras every month to come!

It’s $6 if you choose the monthly option (less for annual), which comes out to $1.50 per email of the Advent series, or $0.75 if you break it down by each email and lock screen included.

If you’re overwhelmed or exhausted, weary or wondering “how much longer?”, filled with genuine hope and joy but also carrying the weight of waiting . . . this is for you. For me. For us.

Let’s look for Him together, in this in between, as we celebrate His arrival while waiting for His return. He will meet us in the Muchness. There’s goodness to be found, written onto every page.

If you’d like to walk through/receive an Advent series but prefer a different format, I have 3 suggestions for you at the bottom, 2 from writers I’ve read for a decade+, and 1 that’s free.²

If you’re already a paying subscriber helping to pay the bills and keep the lights on by supporting this space (thank you!!), the weight of waiting will automatically arrive in your inbox.

If you currently receive Thursday Things + new blog posts for free and would like to receive all the extras (the Advent series + upcoming All The Things extras), upgrade below. Or, if you know someone who might enjoy the weight of waiting, you can give a gift subscription!

If you would be willing to share this on social media? I’d be so grateful. The algorithm will likely bury all posts related to this series, since they point away from IG/FB, and your support through a like/comment/quick share to Stories would seriously mean a lot. I’m planning to announce the weight of waiting on my Instagram and Facebook tomorrow (you’re hearing this first!), but any social media shares encouraging your people to sign up if they’re still looking for an Advent series would be a gift! (Thank you, thank you.)

And lastly: If this series isn’t for you right now, that’s okay. This is simply an extra you can opt into if you want to, a way to support me/my writing/the paying of the medical bills—but in a way where I can give something extra back to you over the coming days. I’m grateful you’re here—free or supporting financially—and will be back in your inbox down the road with the regular emails you previously said yes to: Thursday Things + blog posts.

Grace and peace to you in the beauty and the weight of these days, friend.

1. Pun fully intended. :) See the second-to-last slide of the IG carousel.

2. Other Advent offerings:

ONE) Annie’s Advent series: audio and video format + digital guidebook + Facebook group, $30.

TWO) Emily’s Advent series: audio format of prayers and reflections, $10 (until Dec 6th)

THREE) Another great option, and it’s free: the YouVersion Bible app has dozens of Advent reading plans