I laughed aloud on Sunday when Andy, in a sermon illustration on losing his voice while leading work trips, mused, “If a youth minister can’t call everyone for pizza, is he even a youth minister at all?” Two days later, as I lost my own voice, I was not laughing. Is a preacher with no voice during Advent a preacher at all?

I’m living in faith (and taking all the mucinex, drinking all the tea) that my voice is back by Sunday. But after one anxious, sleepless night worrying about all the things I have to do, I’m really not too worried. Maybe it’s because I’m not one of the countless amazing Lessons and Carols singers, or leading a retreat this weekend, or directing a Christmas pageant. (It’s definitely at least partly because of that). But, moreover, I wonder if it’s because I’m finally starting to remember that Advent is nothing if not the season of the unexpected.

To be fair — all of us have been navigating the unexpected and the unprecedented in their less than holy manifestations for several years now. We are fully justified in any exhaustion we’re carrying (Make sure to come to the Longest Night service at 7pm on December 21, by the way, if your burdens are feeling particular heavy this year). But I guess I am feeling a sense of comfort, of assurance.

Whatever my ambivalences about any historical accuracy of the story of Mary’s unanticipated pregnancy we tell in this season, I take heart from the words of the Angel Gabriel in response to Mary’s very reasonable question, How can this be?  Nothing, Gabriel says, will be impossible with God.

Is a sick minister in Advent a minister at all? Nothing will be impossible with God.

And while I wouldn’t count my increasingly sore throat as a blessing, the unexpected can become an occasion for delight. We concluded Sunday’s services singing “Silent Night,” one of the most beloved Western carols of the last few centuries. That carol was written, you may know, when the organ broke at Franz Gruber’s church just before Christmas. He, with more pastoral resilience than most, wrote the words and then asked the organist to come up with a melody that could be played on a guitar.

Our congregational pianos are due to be tuned next week and we’re knocking on wood that all is well. Still, even when things go sideways, we manage to find reasons to celebrate, and God, however known, manages to be present with us.