Advent is the season in the Christian Church calendar year where people around the world observe four Sundays or four weeks to prepare for the emergence of Hope in a dark world. Advent means arrival, emergence, the birth of something notable — the time when we prepare room for Christ, being reminded of God-with-us.

God-with-us. This phrase evokes a spiritual dimension many of us rarely tap into. God-with-us. Is this true? When you dig into the inner spaces of your soul, traversing through sharp brambles of cynicism, protectively encasing that vulnerable center, it’s there you might experience God-with-us. It’s there you might experience the deep connections you were designed to notice — that God has been with you all along.

Advent invites us to seek and find hope, peace, joy and love. This isn’t something that just happens to us. It takes intention. It requires intention. Without intention, this season becomes hijacked with demands to buy more and be more and do more.

I was 10 years old when I first delivered that heavy Thanksgiving newspaper to doorsteps and breezeways, the packed bag choking me as I walked. Usually I could toss the daily newspaper towards driveways without intention. But this paper was stuffed with shiny and glossy Black Friday advertisements, slippery like grease on a hot pan. It was doubled-banded and I had to place this paper gently so everything wouldn’t burst and spill across wet lawns.

We are bombarded by a fast-paced show of lack / need / wants / scarcity, wheeling-dealing promises declared to meet every insecurity and fill every void.

I think most of us know it’s temporary. The lack still exists and the longing remains unfulfilled. The toys and glitter and tinsel can’t seem to fill those insecure voids for very long. But I get it. A temporary shiny thing might help get us through. You’ve lost a lot this last year. Family members. Friends. Jobs. Health. Security. Faith. Marriage. Those losses — through death, estrangement, divorce, illness, betrayal — feel insurmountable and hopeless. The holidays seem to magnify loss, parading it around our minds front and center.

So we seek hope in future promises and presidents and leaders, wondering if things will get better this time around. Hope came with Obama, with promises in red, white and blue posters created by artist Shepard Fairey. Raised Republican, I remember thinking surely a Democrat can’t bring such hope as promised. Maybe he did. Maybe he didn’t. Maybe we need to stop putting our hope into other humans. Maybe hope doesn’t look like Presidents or empty promises or new wars or cease-fires. Maybe hope doesn’t look like fortified borders and tear gas. Maybe hope doesn’t look like open borders and anarchy. Maybe hope looks like something we’d never dream up on our own, because we keep seeming to get it wrong. Without God-with-us-hope being our axis, we continually place our faith and trust in complicated and arrogant people, many of whom are looking out for their own best interests instead of anything else.

The future might feel a bit hopeless for many of us. It might feel a bit bleak. You might be wondering what hope could even look like today. I think of the quiet folk in those first pages of Luke’s gospel in the Bible — Zechariah, Elizabeth and Mary. I wonder about the hopelessness they felt being occupied by a violent foreign superpower, subjected to heavy taxation and constant threat. They felt the oppressive darkness of the unknown while still bringing hopeful light into their communities — staying deeply connected to each other and their God.

Advent is a season of darkness when we intentionally choose to sit in such uncertainty without skipping past it. As much as we want to plug in floodlights and chase the gloomy shadows away and avoid discomfort, we settle into this paradoxical season — paradoxical because it might be dark right now, but there’s hope (peace, joy and love) just around the corner.

I know we want to get there immediately and feel the cheer promptly, but it’s not time yet. So this week I will light a candle — a candle of hope. I will allow my eyes to adjust to the darkness and settle into flickering shadows. I will take a deep breath and traverse the inner chambers of my heart, pushing back the brambles of cynicism to connect once again to God-with-us who was and is and is to come.

Hope will come. Hope will arrive this Advent.

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Bethany Cseh is a pastor at Arcata United Methodist Church and Catalyst Church.