Advent: a season for a world on the brink
Christmas is hard to preach for me.
God with us, into this world, into our neighborhood. Some days, that seems unbelievable, and these days, it seems inconceivable.
But Advent? Baby, I can preach Advent all day long.
Waiting, expectation, looking for signs, groaning in anticipation: that’s the stuff of this little nihilist’s faith.
I’ve spent the past few months watching the news in horror like many of you. I am not going to pretend that I am an expert on Israel and Palestine, or that I have some kind of moral high ground from which to speak. But as a mother, as a hospital worker, I have felt incapacitated, which is the reason I have not been here. What is there to say?
I work at a children’s hospital. I have prayed over children’s bodies and heard the guttural cries of parents when the doctor tells them their child is dead. There is nothing quite like it.
This violence of children’s death is a rupture in the way the world is supposed to work. Parents should not have to bury their children. Families should not be ripped apart. Homes should not become graves.
Each morning, I listen to hear what the news is from the place where the baby we anticipate during Advent was born.
I’m waiting. I’m hoping in a world where it feels like there is little hope.
Perhaps the reason Advent is more legible to me than Christmas itself is because Advent always begins by shaking you by the shoulders and shouting at you.
The first Sunday of Advent is the person who has been watching global news for three weeks straight, who has not showered, whose eyes are bloodshot from lack of sleep, and who yells at you, “HAVE YOU BEEN PAYING ATTENTION TO THIS HELLSCAPE? DO YOU KNOW WHAT’S GOING ON OUT THERE?”
The sun collapses, the earth floods, and the world as we know it comes crashing down. Advent begins.
But Advent is not only the sleep-deprived person shouting at you in the street.
The first Sunday of Advent is also the persistent hope of protests. The yeast rising in dough. The way the steady rush of water wears down a stone until it is smooth.
As Advent continues, the anticipation builds. Surely, we are about to burst open. Surely, the dam will break, and rushing waters will come our way, rolling like justice.
And we hold our breath and listen for the tiny songs of hope and we gaze at the sky looking for answers among the stars. We tend to what is ours and lay awake at night wondering what the hell is going to happen.
Perhaps the season of Advent feels like a crash landing. Or maybe it’s more of a slow burn.
Either way, we’re keeping watch together.
In case you need another moment to catch your breath, here is a prayer for you today:
God of twilight visits, we confess that we are tired. You have asked us to keep our lamps lit, waiting for you expectantly, ready to receive You when You arrive, having prepared everything for Your visit.
But it’s getting late.
We go back and forth between playing games to stay awake and worrying that something has happened. Did you appear already and we missed You? Have You decided not to come to us after all? We seem to be the only ones awake now—everyone else has turned out their light and turned in for the night. We return to the activities that keep our hands busy and our minds occupied.
God of little flocks and a mustard seed kingdom, no one told us that waiting felt so busy. What are we supposed to be doing? we ask ourselves. Establish the work of our hands, the Psalmist prayed, and we pray that prayer, too, as our thumbs twiddle and our foot taps quietly.
We think of those who got tired of waiting and went to bed. We think of those who have given up hope that You are coming. We want to believe that You are close at hand. Help our unbelief. Help us wait a little longer.
O Holy One who is just around the corner, God of whom we catch a glimpse every once in awhile, God whose Spirit burns faithfully and persistently like the lamps we have lit, help us to stay alert and awake.
Keep our minds on what matters, the poet wrote, which is mostly paying attention and learning to be astonished.
Astonish us, O God.
We are waiting.
Amen.
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