Offer to God a sacrifice of thanksgiving
and make good your vows to the Most High.
Psalm 50:14

Today is the day my equanimity goes out the window. I’m pretty sure this happens every Advent, yet somehow I have managed to forget to put in on my calendar. I know my general evenness comes from years of spiritual practice–not to mention time with therapists, mentors, coaches–and is not a given. I have not perfected calm.

So, honestly, I should have expected this and been prepared. The Advent journey is not only about preparing for the incarnation, about making room for Jesus in our hearts. It is also about expecting to fail at this. The culmination of the journey is the encounter of my imperfect self with perfect humanity in a manger. Of course I will inevitably stumble.

And in my stumbling I am reminded that God does not call me to be flawlessness. God calls me to continue to be faithfully on the way.