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     In the well-known drama by Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot, the lives of the characters are shaped by their position of waiting for someone who will never come.  We who are people of faith also have our life of faith shaped by waiting.  This happens on two levels.  The first is the waiting that is part of telling any story. The liturgical year is the recounting of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.  Most stories are not told from the end to the beginning, but the other way around.  Therefore, in Advent, we begin the story and anticipate the sequence of events, which includes the long wait of the world for the coming of the Messiah.  It is difficult to recapture that long wait, but Isaiah, in today's first scripture, manages to focus our attention on that Lord by rejecting any other possible "Lords."  The second scripture also does this but in an even more focused way with the question posed to Jesus by the disciples of John the Baptist:  Are you the one who is to come, or should we look for another?  By placing the manger scene in our homes and (where permitted in this secular culture} public squares, we indicate that Jesus of Nazareth is the one whom we look to!

     The second level of anticipation is the "second coming" of Jesus Christ.  Just as our faith acknowledges his birth, life, death and resurrection, we also believe that he will come again.  There is no one else for us to anticipate, and unlike the characters in Waiting for Godot, we have much to do while waiting.  Isaiah's prayer for justice should be our agenda.  We can "put skin on" the statue in the manger, and help those who are living in the darkness of suffering and oppression to know that the waiting is not in vain.  AMEN