Advent

"Wait for the LORD; be strong and courageous. Wait for the LORD".

 Psalm 27:14

"Now without faith it is impossible to please God, for the one who draws near to Him must believe that He exists and rewards those who seek Him."

 Hebrews 11:6

Waiting and Faith Go Hand-In-Hand

What's the longest you've had to wait for something?

I imagine almost everyone has a memory of Christmas Eve as a child; squeezing your eyes shut, trying with all your might to go to sleep on Christmas Eve. For those of you with orthodox parents, you knew that even opening one present before Christmas morning was akin to high heresy.

And so you counted sheep and waited.

Waiting is still difficult. We expect everything to be at our fingertips the moment we have the desire for it. It's a world we're growing into and it's addicting. We live in a world of easy downloads, instantaneous email, on demand and food prepared in a few minutes. Yet God finds ways of making us wait. Waiting and faith go hand-in-hand.

• We wait for the baby we've dreamed we'd hold in our arms.
• Some are waiting for their prodigal son to come to the end of himself and return home.
• Many of us are waiting for the phone to ring so we can return to a job with a normal salary and benefits.
• Others are waiting for an eye-opening spiritual breakthrough.

Waiting is the embodiment of faith.

In Hebrews 11:13 we are reminded that faith involves trust in God's promise even if the promises of God are fulfilled long after we're gone. The writer says, "These all died in faith without having received the promises, but they saw them from a distance ..." (Emphasis added.)

Accompany us, God,

through the waiting.

Accompany those displaced

waiting to return to the land.

Accompany those in refugee camps

waiting to go home.

Accompany those in conflict zones

waiting for normality.

Accompany those in violent homes

waiting for silence.

Accompany those imprisoned

waiting for justice.

Accompany us God

through the waiting

until your kingdom comes.

Amen

Advent

Christ was born in the first century, yet He belongs to all centuries. He was born a Jew, yet He belongs to all races. He was born in Bethlehem, yet He belongs to all countries.” – George Washington Truett

William Willimon United Methodist Bishop tells a story of some students he had taken on a mission trip to Haiti during their summer break. During one of the final evenings of the trip, the students sat around a camp fire and shared their favourite passages of scripture with one another: John 10:10, “I come that you shall have life in the full” was one; Romans 8:28, “Nothing can separates us from the love of God…” was another. Then a Haitian woman, who had traveled with the group as a translator piped up. She wasn’t sure of the reference for her favourite bible passage, but she knew it was towards the end of Mark’s Gospel, and it was about the sun going black, and the stars falling from the sky, and Jesus saying, “Woe to pregnant women and nursing mothers”. The students stared at the woman in stunned silence, until one of them had the courage to ask why that passage was her favourite. The woman answered with disarming simplicity: “Because this world is broken, and it needs to come to an end”.

The group later learnt more of this woman’s story. She had a tragic history of pregnancies ending in miscarriages, and the causes were preventable, but for the lack of medical care in Haiti. She didn’t just believe the world was broken at some theoretical level, she knew it in the core of her being.

Advent is a time for naming what is broken about our world, and holding space in order that we might long for a new one. If Lent is about confession (owning our part in what is broken), then Advent is about lament, which doesn’t seek to attribute blame, but settles for an honest naming of reality before God – the only one who can make things right.

There is a tendency to treat Advent like a warm-up band to the headline act. And of course, to an extent, it is that. However, Advent also has a distinct gift of its own – a gift that, if not received, will mean that the great coming of Christ in Christmas is in danger of being missed or misappropriated.

Lord God,

we praise you for sending light into this world.

We confess that we live as though the light had never defeated darkness.

We confess that we ignore the Saviour you sent to be among us and to live in us.

We’ve kept the birth of your Son confined to the Christmas season

and do not yearn for his coming each moment in our waiting hearts.

Forgive us for not opening our eyes to Jesus.

Prepare us for His return.

Help us rejoice in the light,

so that your grace can illuminate

the darkened places of our hearts.  Amen.

Advxent

“The spirit of Christmas needs to be superseded by the Spirit of Christ. The spirit of Christmas is annual; the Spirit of Christ is eternal. The spirit of Christmas is sentimental; the Spirit of Christ is supernatural. The spirit of Christmas is a human product; the Spirit of Christ is a divine person. That makes all the difference in the world.”

– Stuart Briscoe

He was born in an obscure village, the child of a peasant woman. He grew up in still another village, where he worked in a carpenter shop until he was thirty. Then for three years he was an itinerant preacher.

He never wrote a book.

He never held an office.

He never had a family or owned a house.

He didn’t go to college.

He never traveled 200 miles from the place where he was born.

He did none of these things one usually associates with greatness.

He had no credentials but himself.

He was only 33 when public opinion turned against him. His friends ran away. He was turned over to his enemies and went through the mockery of a trial. He was nailed to a cross between two thieves.

When he was dying, his executioners gambled for his clothing, the only property he had on earth. When he was dead, he was laid in a borrowed grave through the pity of a friend.

Nineteen centuries have come and gone, and today he is the central figure of the human race, the leader of mankind’s progress.

All the armies that ever marched, all the navies that ever sailed, all the parliaments that ever sat, all the kings that ever reigned, put together, have not affected the life of man on earth as much as that One Solitary Life.

Isaiah 53: 3 He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

4 Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.

5 But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed.

silently and gently

falling and failing

changing and resting

seeking you, Lord…

we watch

we wait

we dream

we pray…

for the earth to renew

for our hearts to soften

for your grace to cover us

for your justice to pour out

for time and space to listen

for courage to act

on the edge of Advent,

we sit with you…

we pause…

we hurt…

we repent…

we rage…

When will it be?

Will it ever be?

Come quickly, Lord Jesus.

Amen.

Advent

A girl of ten years went with a group of family and friends to see the Christmas light displays at various locations throughout the city. At one church, they stopped and got out to look more closely at a beautifully done nativity scene. “Isn’t that beautiful?” said the little girl’s grandmother. “Look at all the animals, Mary, Joseph and the baby Jesus.” “Yes, Grandma,” replied the granddaughter. “It is really nice. But there is only one thing that bothers me. Isn’t baby Jesus ever going to grow up… he’s the same size he was last year.”

Perhaps, more to the point, how much have we grown since the last Christmas.

In one Peanuts comic strip Sally was struggling with her memory verse for Sunday. She was absorbed in her thoughts trying to figure it out when she remembered, “Maybe it was something from the book of Reevaluation.”

She never did find the memory verse, but we should always read the Bible with the intent of reevaluating our attitudes and actions to make sure they are in line with the truth of God’s Word.

William Parks puts it this way “Christmas is not just a day, an event to be observed and speedily forgotten. It is a spirit which should permeate every part of our lives.”

“Therefore, dear friends, since you have been forewarned, be on your guard so that you may not be carried away by the error of the lawless and fall from your secure position. But grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. To him be glory both now and forever! Amen.” — 2 Peter 3:17-18, NIV

Advent God,

we journey with you,

to Bethlehem’s stable

and a new-born King,

ears attuned

to the song of angels,

eyes alert

for Bethlehem’s star.

Forgive us

if on our journey

if we are distracted

by the tempting offers

of this world.

Keep our hearts aflame

with the hope

of Christmas,

and the promise

of a Saviour. Amen

Advent

A television interviewer was walking streets of Tokyo at Christmas time. Much as in any city, Christmas shopping is a big commercial success in Japan. The interviewer stopped one young woman on the sidewalk, and asked, “What is the meaning of Christmas?”

Laughing, she responded, “I don’t know. Is that the day that Jesus died?”

There was some truth in her answer.

God in a manger
Defenceless, enfleshed
Immanuel crying
And fighting for breath

God in a manger
Wriggling and raw
Laid out on the wood
Enthroned on the straw

God at Golgotha
Pierced in His flesh
Immanuel crying
And fighting for breath

God at Golgotha
Forsaken and lost
Stretched out on the wood
Enthroned on the cross

Advent is about seeing beyond the Crib and seeing the shadow of the cross. During Advent the summons to the wood of the Cradle and the wood of the Cross are so apparent. — At this time and place of Advent, both are empty, the Cradle and the Cross. The Baby Jesus is yet to be born and the Man Jesus is yet to be crucified.

In this sense it is a time of emptiness — not so much fraught with anticipation as with a deeply subdued hope of things to be. It is a time of darkness that verges on impending Light, a time of indistinct shadows in a twilight pervading the universe and the deepest recesses of the soul. In our hope we perceive our poverty and our misery — and we seek our deliverance. We are wanting.

Whether we turn to the Son, or away from Him, the shadow remains and nothing we do can diminish its length or alter its direction. Advent is a time for us to reflect on our end in light of His beginning, on our own death in light of His birth. We number our days ... but to disordered ends. We behold dissolution, and we despair ... instead of grasping the reality of the Resurrection, and rejoicing.

Accompany us, God,

through the waiting.

Accompany those displaced

waiting to return to the land.

Accompany those in refugee camps

waiting to go home.

Accompany those in conflict zones

waiting for normality.

Accompany those in violent homes

waiting for silence.

Accompany those imprisoned

waiting for justice.

Accompany us God

through the waiting

until your kingdom comes.

Amen.

Advent

“The mystery of the humanity of Christ, that He sunk Himself into our flesh, is beyond all human understanding.” Martin Luther

Evangelist Luis Palau tells of a wealthy European family that decided to have their newborn baby baptised in their enormous mansion. Dozens of guests were invited to the elaborate affair, and they all arrived dressed to the nines. After depositing their elegant wraps on a bed in an upstairs room, the guests were entertained royally.

Soon the time came for the main purpose of their gathering: the infant’s baptismal ceremony. But where was the baby? No one seemed to know. The child’s governess ran upstairs and returned with a desperate look on her face. Everyone searched frantically for the baby. Then someone recalled having seen him asleep on one of the beds. The baby was on a bed all right—buried beneath a pile of coats, jackets, and furs. The object of that day’s celebration had been forgotten, neglected, and nearly smothered.

The baby whose birthday we celebrate at Christmas is easily hidden beneath the piles of traditions and cultural observances of the season. We need to enter every Advent season asking, 

“Where’s the baby?”

Luke 2:12  “And this will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger.”

– Martin Luther, Table Talk.

Ah, dearest Jesus, Holy Child
Ah, dearest Jesus, Holy Child,
Make thee a bed, soft, undefiled,
Within my heart, that it may be
A quiet chamber kept for Thee.
My heart for very joy doth leap,
My lips no more can silence keep,
I too must sing, with joyful tongue,
That sweetest ancient cradle song,
Glory to God in highest heaven,
Who unto man His Son hath given
While angels sing with pious mirth.
A glad new year to all the earth. Amen

–

Advent

In this poem written some fifteen centuries ago, Augustine tried to capture the mystery of the Incarnation:

Maker of the sun,
He is made under the sun.
In the Father he remains,
From his mother he goes forth.
Creator of heaven and earth,
He was born on earth under heaven.
Unspeakably wise,
He is wisely speechless.
Filling the world,
He lies in a manger.
Ruler of the stars,
He nurses at his mother’s bosom.
He is both great in the nature of God,
And small in the form of a servant.

Colossians 1:16 expressed it this way, “For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him.”

As Christians, we are privileged to know the Creator of the universe. So when we study a tiny wildflower or marvel at the vastness of the Milky Way, we are reminded of the One who made all of it. In a deeply personal expression of praise, the psalmist wrote, “O Lord, our Lord, how excellent is Your name in all the earth” Psalm 8:1Do you know that all creation points to a Creator? Albert Einstein did not make a profession of Christian faith. But like many others he looked at the wonders of the universe and knew there had to be a God. An interviewer once asked him if he was an atheist. He said No, and then said this:

“I’m not an atheist. The problem involved is too vast for our limited minds. We are in the position of a little child entering a huge library filled with books in many languages. The child knows someone must have written those books. It does not know how. It does not understand the languages in which they are written. The child dimly suspects a mysterious order in the arrangement of the books but doesn’t know what it is. That, it seems to me, is the attitude of even the most intelligent human being toward God. We see the universe marvellously arranged and obeying certain laws but only dimly understand these laws.”

Albert Einstein understood the eternal power and divine nature of God from what God has made. How come? Because the creation, especially the heavens, reveal knowledge of God to humankind.

O God, grant us a sense of your timing.

In this season of short days and long nights,

of grey and white and cold,

teach us the lessons of beginnings;

that such waitings and endings may be the starting place,

a planting of seeds which bring to birth what is ready to be born—

something right and just and different,

a new song, a deeper relationship, a fuller love—

in the fullness of your time.

O God, grant us the sense of your timing. Amen