The Gospel reading for the first Sunday of Advent has as its theme waiting; waiting on the Son of Man. As Advent precedes Christmas we meditate on how we wait for the coming/birth of Jesus into our world. Our meditation is on waiting.

We all know what it is to wait – at the long line to cash our groceries at month end, for a visa to visit the USA, for a passport to the get the visa, in traffic to anywhere these days. Some people adopt strategies to cope – I saw one person in the traffic dancing to music in her car.

Jesus provides us with several metaphors on waiting for the Son of Man; the flood which speaks to the suddenness and unexpectedness of the coming, the indiscriminate way in which some are taken and some left, the need to stay awake and stand ready.

A few years ago I was working with a programme that provided funding to community groups to design and carry out projects that would benefit poor and vulnerable persons in their communities. One group applied for funding to start a garment factory for unemployed women in their community.

As the officer responsible, I encouraged the group to mobilise the women and worked with them for a year to design and implement the project for themselves.

It was a long time to wait for $150,000 but the women endured, understanding that if their project were to succeed they had to prepare themselves, develop their skills – sewing and business – to run this project.

This for me is what Advent is all about, developing a spirituality of waiting. The Son of Man comes in different ways – a person who journeys with us in a difficult time, a boss who gives us the support and encouragement to be productive, a successful project for unemployed women.

Waiting for the Son of Man has to be creative and not seen as punishment. In our culture today waiting is not the preferred option, we need things, services right away.

When the group of women started their projects it was not given to them by the community group but they had created it themselves through agreeing to go on a journey of self-development and self-reliance. It is in moments like these that the Son of Man comes to us.

As sure as night follows day, economic downturns/recessions follow times of economic boom. The recession of the early 1980s after the boom of the 1970s came like a burglar in the night. Many people lost their jobs and houses and fell into hard times; some were taken and some were left.

I remember a small group of us discussing what we could do to help and eventually responding by setting up a community library  - an effort to prepare our young people to withstand the impact of the economic hard times.

There are many creative projects run by people who are preparing others to withstand the burglars who want to break through the wall of their houses. These creative responses also prepare us for opportunities that present themselves to us. They prepare us for the coming of the Son of Man

Lord, we pray for those who work with the poor and vulnerable in their communities preparing them, journeying and waiting with them for the coming of the Son of Man.

We pray for our leaders who are managing our country in this time of plenty, give them the knowledge and wisdom and the ability to utilise our resources in such a way that when the burglars come our walls would not be penetrated.

Gospel Meditations for December are by Gary Tagallie of the parish of St Philip &St James, Chaguanas. The Programme Manager of the Poverty Reduction programme of the Ministry of Social Development, Gary and his wife Sheila Maria are the parents of four young children.