Our fourth Advent word is “expectation.” Do you remember being a young child and waiting for Christmas? Or seeing that sense of expectation in your children or grandchildren? Expectation can bring disappointment, but it also comes with a sense of excitement. Dread and expectation both imply a change in present circumstances, but where the former produces a sense of fear, the latter is more positive. In the Christmas carol, “O Little Town of Bethlehem,” we sing: “O little town of Bethlehem, how still we see the lie; above thy deep and dreamless sleep the silent stars go by. Yet in thy dark streets shineth the everlasting light; the hopes and fears of all the years are met in thee tonight.”

The author of the song, Phillip Brooks, wrote it in 1865 following a pilgrimage to Bethlehem. According to the story, Brooks traveled on horseback between Jerusalem and Bethlehem on Christmas Eve. He wrote: “Before dark we rode out of town to the field where they say the shepherds saw the star … Somewhere in those fields we rode through, the shepherds must have been. As we passed, the shepherds were still ‘keeping watch over their flocks.’” Bethlehem, on that first Christmas night, had its hopes and fears. A Messiah was promised, but the promises were hundreds, if not thousands, of years old. Rome ruled with an iron fist. There was more fear than hope. As Brooks, an American from Pennsylvania, wrote these words from the other side of the world, his nation was caught up in war. His own state had not so long ago experienced that great battle at Gettysburg where some 50,000 men died – the costliest battle in U.S. history. Again, there was more fear than hope.

When we look at the world around us, what is our expectation? Jesus said, in John 14, as paraphrased in The Message: “Don’t let this rattle you. You trust God, don’t you? Trust me. There is plenty of room for you in my Father’s home. If that weren’t so, would I have told you that I’m on my way to get a room ready for you? And if I’m on my way to get your room ready, I’ll come back and get you so you can live where I live.” Advent reminds us that our expectation in what’s coming will be greater than anyone we could ever imagine, better than any Christmas present we ever waited for and opened on Christmas morning. Christmas gifts break or are forgotten, but the gift of Christmas lives within us and is eternal.