“I ask you: What labor of love has God asked of you, only to bear fruit far different than expected or imagined? How has your desire been distilled in response? Trust, allow, distill. This is how God prepares and purifies our desire, beginning with our most modest hopes and needs and gradually enlarging our hearts to encompass more and more of the world’s suffering and joy. Until one day, we awake to find we desire nothing less than the Day of the Lord.” Br. Keith Nelson weighs – against his own recent and upcoming experience – the sometimes conflicting Advent exhortations toward waiting and hard work, in preparation to meet the coming Christ.