Loading...You may wonder why – on this first Sunday of Advent with a candle lit, greenery up, and four Sundays but just three weeks and a day until Christmas – we aren’t more in the Christmas Spirit.
Where are the stories about preparing for the Savior’s birth?
Where are the stories about Hannah and Elizabeth – older women who desperately wanted a child and who were each given one who then became a great prophet in his time?
Where are the stories about Mary – a younger woman who was nowhere near ready for a child, yet is told by the angel Gabriel that she will have one?
Instead of those stories,
we get a “story” of darkness, cataclysm;
a “story” of a fig tree that helps us tell the seasons;
and an exhortation to keep alert, stay awake, and be prepared!
Keep your lamps trimmed and burnin’
Keep your lamps trimmed and burnin’
Keep your lamps trimmed and burnin’
the time is drawing nigh.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
We cannot get sidelined into the cultural hoopla of Christmas
(the “25 days of Christmas”?!?), or
sidetracked by the idealized and romanticized Christmas story, or
Lord love a duck, off the rails with the discombobulated version of St. Nicholas morphed into Santa Claus.
Don’t get me wrong, lights, decorations, music, and sweets of Christmas time are lovely and fun,
but they are not about Advent.
They’re not really even about Jesus.
These four Sundays of Advent are a time of preparation
but not for Christmas, per se.
They are a time of waiting, watching, paying attention, and preparing for
Christ’s surprising and unexpected presence and action in our lives and in our world.
Did you hear some scriptural echoes in our Gospel lesson today that remind you of some of our parables and stories from the end of Matthew’s Gospel (which we heard during November)?
•there was the man who left on the journey and left his servants in charge
•there was the owner of the house who went out and no one knew when said owner would return – except like a thief in the night;
• and there were the bridesmaids with their lamps to keep trimmed and burning.
Advent is a time to remind ourselves –
especially in the midst of Christmas preparation craziness –
to stay alert,
to keep awake,
to be patient,
to pay attention to God at work, and
to keep watch for the ways that Christ shows up.
Children don’ get weary
Children don’ get weary
Children don’ get weary
‘til your work is done.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Advent includes the message that the Holy Spirit is at work in the midst of the cataclysmic change, the transformation, and the new heaven and the new earth that is promised and emerging.
Yet, as we are surrounded by and exhausted by
the racism,
the economic inequality which will surely be compounded now,
the petty greed and destructive corruption, and
the ethical paucity that seems to be all around –
not just in our area or country, but all around the world –
we are still a people who live in hope.
In our weariness,
we turn to God who has shown up for us
in the unexpected, surprising, transformative, and life-giving ways.
And who will continue to do so.
How?
This is our call and invitation in Advent:
Open your eyes, your ears, and your hearts
to the way Christ has been and continues to be present.
Sometimes, when I hear myself say that (aloud or just to myself)
I wonder, well? How will I know?
That’s when I play the “imagine this...” game, a la It’s a Wonderful Life.
If this person or organization or movement were not here
how would the world be different?
How would we be lessened for their absence?
That question and the answers to it help me to recognize
the work of God
the presence of Christ, and
the transformation of the Spirit.
Christian journey soon be over
Christian journey soon be over
Christian journey soon be over
the time is drawing nigh.
Peace to you on the Advent journey of watching, waiting, paying attention, and staying alert!
Amen
