God is in the Manger

I will be posting about Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s God Is in the Manger: Reflections on Advent and Christmas , edited by Jana Riess. The first week of Bonhoeffer’s book about Advent ponders the first week as Waiting.

Bonhoeffer: “Celebrating Advent means being able to wait. … Whoever does not know the austere blessedness of waiting — that is, of hopefully doing without — will never experience the full blessing of fulfillment.”

I was struck by that “hopefully … doing without.” Think about it. That’s what the first week of Advent is about: waiting, but it means doing without in a hopeful anticipation. Yet, without for awhile.