During the Cold War, I served for two years on an army missile site in Germany. Vivid in my memory was the trip across the Atlantic on a troop ship filled with 1500 other men. For eleven days, I served guard duty on one of the decks on the 3:00 to 6:00 A.M. shift. It was cold, damp, and windy on the deck, and I remember longing for daybreak.

Years later, as a new Christian, I came across this verse of Scripture: “I wait for the Lord more than watchmen wait for the morning, more than watchmen wait for the morning” (Psalm 130:6). I recalled that longing for morning, but recognized this new, more forceful ache for the Lord’s presence.

A regular theme in scripture is expectancy—a waiting for the Lord. We are called into waiting, awareness, and alertness by such passages as Psalm 27: “Wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord.”

Expectancy is the theme of Advent. As we read the gospel stories of Mary and Elizabeth, John the Baptist and Jesus, we feel their breathless excitement in the midst of a calm confidence in the Lord’s working.

This Advent season, I’m keeping in mind the memory of that longing years ago as I walked the windy, darkened deck of a troop ship. This memory prompts my heart to look forward with a holy intention to the Lord’s coming at Christmas.

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Do you have a memory of expectancy that brings to mind the desire to eagerly await the Lord’s coming this season?