First Sunday of Advent. It marks the church’s new year; but rather than what sort of promises of self-improvement we are going to make to ourselves, as some of us do with New Year’s Day of the secular calendar (ironically the Gregorian calendar), the church’s new year instead marks a humble turn in community to what classically gets termed “waiting.”
“Waiting,” it sounds sweet, almost cute, like children in an animated cartoon special waiting for Santa Claus. It is true that Advent means “waiting.” This waiting is soooo not that waiting.
You see the thing with Advent is the FOLLOWING, and the HOPE – hope not in presents, but in God. Advent waiting looks like following, and it looks like hope.
We all know that we are waiting for the coming of Christ, for God with us, Emmanuel. “O come, o come Emmanuel.” Then we get to the readings for this Sunday and we run head on into the other Advent we are waiting for— as Christians we are also waiting for the second coming of Christ. The readings, of course, set us up for this. The next few weeks have prophetic Old Testament readings, which give testimony to what God does in the world, and for which we as Christians, God begins to fulfill in Christ. The Epistle, at least this week, speaks of the infancy of Christianity, the nurturing that Paul feels towards this fledgling Thessalonica community, as they, like us, stumble towards anticipation of Jesus’ return.
Advent, of course, immediately precedes Christmas, at which we celebrate that fulfillment of God’s mission – or the HOPE for it – in the birth of the Christ child. This leads to some natural ambiguity in our Advent waiting. What exactly are we waiting for?
Are we waiting for the Christ child? for Christ to come into our hearts? or are we waiting for Jesus to come again?
Why choose? We celebrate them both; we nod at both. We need both. We need the joy of the Christ child’s coming, and we need the second coming to make the work of Christ complete, making a disordered creation fully right again. As we head towards the winter solstice in the northern hemisphere, as things getting darker and darker and we hunger for light… we are waiting for both. I think it also helps to have this sort of double meaning of Advent, this ambiguity around for what exactly are we waiting. It’s what we call, a “both… and.”
I think the best part of this ambiguity is that it readily reflects the ecclesial mood of the season, and it also feels authentic. We just finished the great green season of ordinary time, from Pentecost until now, in which we marched through, marking time. Our other true liturgical seasons beside Advent and Christmas are Lent and Easter. Lent has a feeling, a mode of penitence to it. In contrast we have the excitement and joy in the Easter season. The one problem with Lent and Easter is that we may not feel particularly penitent during Lent or particularly joyful during Eastertide. During Advent, however, it is pretty easy to feel hopeful, because the world is always a mess and so hoping for better is pretty normal; and yet we can also feel a bit disoriented. Our disorientation is made more poignant when we as the church are out of step with the prevailing consumer culture of the pre-Christmas days.
But there is hope, and our waiting in Advent looks like hope. Tradition has that the theme of the first Advent candle is Hope. I’m not sure about that, but there is a pervasion of hope through all the lessons for today. It does not only pervade but guides and perhaps sings alongside us.
I want to be clear, something along the lines of truth in advertising, — hope in God does not necessarily offer a happy landing place. Hope pervades above all and where we are. Hope has more to do with how you are in your soul, despite how things may be on the outside of you. Hope has to do with the peace of God, the peace that passes all understanding. And that comes from FOLLOWING.
Revisiting the lessons:
—the Old Testament from the book of Jeremiah, is addressing a people who have been beaten, beaten down, displaced, and things do not look up. But they follow God, and they trust. Trusting in God is not magically going to change this situation, but knowing that God is in it with them changes who they are as a people.
—Paul addressing the community at Thessalonica, correcting their beliefs, as they wait for the return of Jesus, hoping does not bring Jesus to them faster, but hope bears faith and understanding and peace. The Christ they hope for is meant to be followed, followed through practice of peace making, and so faith making..
—The Gospel: Hope does not bring the Son of Man in the cloud, nor does hope change the fig tree (or climate change or the coronavirus mutations), but hope does elevate our hearts so that we are not “weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and the worries of this life, and that day catch [us] unexpectedly, like a trap.”
For it is hope, hope in God that
Leads us in doing right *
and teaches us God’s way.
Following…following God’s way.
And therefore, despite how we may feel or what ambiguity we have as to what exactly we are waiting for, we follow the paths of the Lord, which are love and faithfulness *, it is hope that guides us to keep God’s covenant and God’s testimonies.
Advent waiting does not look like the expectation of presents, though presents are fun. Advent waiting does not look like waiting for a day on the calendar to approach. And it certainly does not look like the acquisition of more stuff. Advent waiting looks like hope. And it looks like following. Following the One in whom we hope, who will in the fullness of time make all creation whole.
Sarah Colvin
Jeremiah 33:14-16
1 Thessalonians 3:9-13
Luke 21:25-36
Psalm 25:1-9