1st Sunday of Advent – B
December 3, 2023
Our Lady of Grace Parish, Bel Air
The Evergreens
Today, the Cherokee Nation is the largest tribe of Native Americans in the United States.
More then 141,000 Cherokee Nation citizens reside in the tribe’s reservation in northeastern Oklahoma. The Cherokee tradition has a story about creation.
The story says that when the plants and trees were first made, the Great Mystery (and that is their name for God) the Great Mystery said this to them. “I want you to keep watch over the earth for seven nights.”
The young trees and plants were so excited that the first night they did not find it difficult at all to keep watch. However, the second night was not so easy, and a few of them fell asleep.
On the third and fourth nights, more of them fell asleep. By the time the seventh night came, the only trees and plants keeping watch were the cedar, the fir, the holly, the laurel, the pine, and the spruce.
The Great Mystery said, “What wonderful endurance you have! You shall be given the gift of remaining green forever.
“You will be the guardians of the forest. Even in the dead of winter, your brother and sister creatures will find life protected in your branches.”
Ever since then, all the other trees and plants lose their leaves and sleep all winter. But the evergreens keep their leaves and keep watch.
Be Watchful
This story from some of our indigenous peoples has a good Advent message.
The evergreens are an image of being watchful. In today’s gospel, Jesus uses the expression “Watch” or “Be watchful” four times.
Some of Catholic and other Christian writers say that spirituality is the discipline of watching or being watchful. Being able to see God acting and hear God speaking depends on this.
Two questions pop up for me. How do we become watchful? And what does this do for us?
How?
First, how can we be spiritually watchful?
For me, this can be answered with one word: stillness. We need some stillness in our lives.
This is not easy. Most of us are busy people, most of us are doers, and we usually do not value just being still.
But from my own experience, I am convinced that we need this. So, I recommend that we try to carve out at least five minutes of stillness each day.
Ideally, to have this, we need to be alone and to be doing nothing. Maybe we can find a time and place in our home or somewhere else for this.
Practically speaking, for many of us, this stillness may have to happen when we are alone but driving the car or walking for some exercise. But it is important to do this without any music or news coming from our radio or through our ear buds.
This stillness may be a new idea and five minutes may at first feel like five hours. But it is essential if we are going to be watchful as Jesus calls us to be.
What?
That takes me to the other question: What does this do for us?
Well, when we are still, we can first be in touch with ourselves – with what is going on in our lives, with our commitments to family or friends, with the stress of our jobs, with the upset in a relationship. Stillness first makes us watchful in these ways.
And then, in this stillness, we watch for God. How is God speaking to me or nudging me right now?
What is it that God wants me to do? What does God want me to say?
Our stillness and our being watchful in this way will allow God to mold us, to make us who we really are to be. In our first reading today, there is the wonderful image of the potter and the clay.
Isaiah images God as a potter fashioning us like a lump of clay. So, in our stillness and watchfulness, God molds us as persons.
This won’t happen for you and me quickly. But over time, little by little, God the potter will shape us more and more into his image and likeness and more and more in the way of Jesus.
Conclusion
I hope that the evergreens of our Advent Wreath remind us of the story from the Cherokees.
And I hope that this story reminds us to watch – to have some stillness and to stay watchful.
