Lord Save Us
Advent 1C-24
Immanuel Lutheran, Chicago
“Now when these things begin to take place, look up and raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near” (Luke 21:28).
To understand the season of Advent picture a collapsed building in Gaza. People there beneath the rubble are still alive. Friends and neighbors crowd at the surface. They begin to work feverishly to uncover loved ones. Those trapped in the pile can do nothing. An agonizing period of waiting and dying is all that remains.
Then suddenly, voices are heard. They cry out, “Help is on the way!” The disheartened victim feels their heart leap. They shout, “Here I am. Come soon!” A final, desperate hammer blow. Just one more step and they are pulled free. Their desperate joy-filled rescue is what Advent feels like.
Advent needs no explanation to political prisoners jailed without justice, or to immigrants forcibly separated from their families, or to the sick longing for healing. Overwhelming joy rises quickly and naturally in them upon hearing the message, “Today you are delivered.”
‘Think of those who strive to lead a Christian life and yet fail; think of the son who can no longer look his father in the eye, or the husband who can no longer look his wife in the eye. Think of the addict who tells themselves, ‘Tomorrow I will stop,’ while knowing it is a lie. Think of the disruption of these lives and the hopeless mess they are in. And then let us hear again, “Look up, raise your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.” (Inspired and from an Advent Sermon given by Dietrich Bonhoeffer in London in 1933).
Some of you will remember with me the immortal line by Jack Nicholson in A Few Good Men, “You can’t handle the truth!” I confess, there have been times when Jack Nicholson could have been talking about me. But sooner or later, we all need Advent. Sooner or later, Advent comes. The truth is revealed, and our healing can begin.
Advent is the invitation to tell the truth. Advent calls for honesty, even when honesty leads us straight to lamentation. In Advent, we are invited to describe life “on earth as it is,” and not as we wish it to be or as we mistakenly assume our religion requires us to render it…. “Eschewing all forms of denial, polite piety, and cheap cheer, Advent invites us to allow the radical honesty of Scripture to make us honest, too. We’re asked to stop posturing and pretending. To come to the end of ourselves. To get real. Advent reminds us that we are not called to an escapist, denial-based piety. We are called to dwell courageously in the truth.” (Debi Thomas, “When You See These Things,” Journey with Jesus, 11/25/18).
Yes. We are not enough. Yes. We have messed things up. And yes! Despite this, Advent confronts us with another astonishing truth: the fullness of God’s grace is pleased to dwell in you, here, now, just as you are. Such grace is the beginning of our new life in Christ –a life of abundance, transformed to overflowing by the indelible dignity and love God pours out in each of us right here, right now, in this very moment, and in all the moments that follow. Look up, lift your heads for your rescuer draws near.
In his beautiful book of contemplation, In the Shelter, poet and theologian Pádraig Ó Tuama asks, “How do we say hello to here?” That is, how do we live honestly in our own skins? How do we accept what’s in front of us? How do we guard against numbness, denial, and despair? In his opening chapter, Ó Tuama describes the challenge: “Much of our desire to not-name a place is because we fear that in naming it we are giving it power, and by giving it power we are saying we may not escape. …. To name something can be to call it into being, and we do not wish to call certain things into any kind of being.” (Thomas)
In prophetic language that sounds distressingly contemporary, Jesus describes a world reeling in pain. Roaring seas, distress among nations, people fainting in fear. “When you see these things,” Jesus says, don’t turn away. Don’t hide. Why? Because it’s only when we embrace reality — when we acknowledge and welcome the “here” of human suffering — that we experience the nearness of God.” (Thomas)
Black Friday dreams get our hearts pumping. Sparkly colored lights, and Christmas music saturate every store with the whispered promise that our not-enough lives will finally be better if we acquire more stuff. Grown-ups and sleeping children alike begin to dream of becoming a billionaire. Because, maybe then, we could be enough. But, in the light of day, this dream reveals itself to be a nightmare drowning us in debt, a way of filling storage lockers and garbage dumps more than our human hearts; leaving us to live with pollution and death more than the flourishing and abundant life God intends.
The holy season of Advent which begins today is set to a different tune. The Church begins its new year as the days are still getting darker. Our story begins — not with twinkly lights— but with the world as it really is, here and now. Gorgeous, fragile, and falling apart. “Stand up and raise your heads.” Look. Your rescuer draws near! Advent helps us say hello to here and find redemption in the most startling places. (Thomas)
Advent reminds us that next spring’s seeds break open in dark winter soil. God’s Spirit hovers over dark water, preparing to create worlds. The child we wait for grows in the deep darkness of the womb. ‘Our food is expectation,’ writes Nora Gallagher about Advent. In this season, we strive to find ‘not perfection, but possibility.’” (Thomas)
“So. How do we say hello to here? We begin, Pádraig Ó Tuama writes, by admitting that “the rotten fruit of illusion rarely fills for long.” Advent is an antidote to illusion. It cuts to the chase. It insists on the truth. It lays us bare. Advent invites us to dwell richly in the here, precisely because here is where God dwells when the oceans heave, the ground shakes, and our hearts are gripped by fear. ‘When you see these things,’ Jesus says, hope fiercely and live truthfully. Deep in the gathering dark, something tender continues to grow. Yearn for it, wait for it, notice it, imagine it. Something beautiful — something for the world’s saving — waits to be born.” (Thomas)
