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While We Wait: Living the Questions of Advent, by Mary Lou Redding


Pre-Advent small groups have been reading and discussing this book since mid-October as we prepare to celebrate the coming of Christ—but have started to do so before the busyness of the holidays takes all our attention.


If you didn’t sign up for a small group study, you still have an opportunity to take advantage of this thoughtful resource during the Advent season proper, which begins on Sunday, November 29, and goes through Christmas Eve.


While designed for small groups, the book’s weekly lessons may also easily be used for individual study and reflection. In fact, much of the book’s devotional practice takes place outside of the group, as the author provides daily Bible readings and questions to contemplate. Tese can then be discussed in weekly groups or simply taken to heart by the individual.


While We Wait examines questions raised by parts of the Christmas story told in the gospels and Old Testament that we sometimes overlook. Tese include the lengthy genealogy of Jesus, which pointedly includes three women—Tamar, Rahab, and Ruth—two of whom engage in some form of prostitution. Te underlying theme of their stories is one of hope.


Other stories that figure into the Jesus story in the gospels include those of Elizabeth and Zechariah, Mary, and the Magi. Questions that the stories in the scriptures and this book raise include “Why have I found favor in your sight?” “Why has this happened to me?” and “How can this be?”


Each week’s lesson begins with a reading from the book that can usually be completed in 15 minutes or less. At the end of each chapter are daily Bible readings for five days with reflection/ journaling questions that build on the passages. Te daily devotions each conclude with a “breath prayer”—an ancient form of meditative prayer in which you inwardly repeat two short phrases that are timed to the taking in and letting out of your breath.


Te book overall strives to bring us into the presence of God. “What are the questions you bring to God?” the author writes. “May each of you hear what God says to you and, through these stories, to all of us.”


“...My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked with favor on the lowliness of his servant. Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; for the Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name.”


—Luke 1:46–49 10


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