Long before the birth of Christ the poet-prophet Isaiah of the Exile gave lyrical expression to Israel’s longing for God to decisively intervene when he sang, “O that you would rend the heaven and come down!” And in the fullness of time God did rend the heavens and come down when sent forth his Son into the world born of a woman. But it was a long wait. From Isaiah’s poetic cry for God to come down until the babe of Bethlehem was wrapped in swaddling clothes and laid in a manger was more than five full centuries. Advent is our humble reenactment of this long wait.