Advent is the "season of waiitng," the anticipation of Christ's arrival . . . Jesus CAME! Jesus is COMING! Jesus COMES!
Certainly, our waiting practice is to "join" those who had been waiting for centuries for The Messiah and particularly, those who were promised His arrival was just around the corner ... Zechariah, Elizabeth, Joseph, and Mary as well as Anna and Simeon, whom we meet just a week after His birth.
Advent leads us to engage the texts of promise throughout the history of Israel and hope with God's People for His Deliverer.
Advent invites us to "walk alongside" the participants of Jesus' entrance into history and join them in their journey, looking at the events leading to and surrounding His' birth from their perspecitves with fresh eyes and attentive hearts, minds, and souls as to what God said to them and what He might be saying to us in our waiting for His Coming (His "answer," His wisdom, His activity) in our own circumstances.
Advent affirms that as Jesus came then, fulfilling hundreds of prophecies, He will come again as He promised and will fulfill the remaining prophecies written about Him ... actually written "by" Him through the working of the Spirit in the lives of those who put quills to parchment so many millenia past.
Advent is ... WAITING ... and WAITING ... and WAITING but not in a vacuum. Advent is waiting WITH certain hope, a hope that is real but just has not arrived yet.
Advent is FULL of expectation, like a gift wrapped, under the tree, and destined to be ripped open, bringing the greatest joy possible.
Advent ... WAIT for .... HOPE in ... EXPECT no one esle but ... JESUS!