By the Rev. Frances A. Hills,
Rector
It’s Advent I, and so we begin
again a New Year in the Christian Church calendar.
Four years ago today, on Advent I, 2007, you and I worshiped
together for the very first time. We were in the building at Main & Taconic
when we began our life together as parish and priest.
Three years ago today, we were here at Crissey Farm. ‘Glad to be
“in out of the cold”. ‘Sort of huddled together
and basically in shock with what had befallen us.
Two years ago, again at Crissey Farm, we were stressed out by
insurance company deadlines. We were also feeling the stress of being a
congregation in transition. We’d been hurled into a journey we hadn’t asked
for. It was a journey from where we’d been to where God was leading us—and we
didn’t know the way! We were starting to discern what the best for our parish
was, and there were many differing ideas!
By last Advent I, we had sold the building, and we were welcoming the
people of St. George Lee to worship with us here. The people of St. George were
in their own kind of transition. They’d said goodbye to their beloved rector,
and were in the process of selling their
property.
A lot has happened to us in the
past four years, hasn’t it? (!)
Each new liturgical year has
brought its own joys and challenges for us as communities of God’s people. Yet
for last year and this year, as in every year on Advent I, the themes for the day are perfect: HOPE and
LIGHT and KEEPING ALERT.
In our first reading from Isaiah,
the people have just returned to Jerusalem from exile in Babylon. Life is
chaotic. Nothing like it was before: Their
beloved city is desolate. Their temple is destroyed. Life in Jerusalem, as they
knew it before the exile, is simply
gone. And, having been in exile, the people are different as well. So the people of God call for God
to come to them, to INTERVENE,“O that you would tear open the heavens and come
down!”
They complain and blame when
God is angry with them or hiding from them, and then their faith weakens, and
they fall away, “We all fade like a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind,
take us away.”
They remind God that God has made them and molded them, “We are the
clay, and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand…we are all your
people.” They are begging God to come to them, to shed light on their darkness, and
to make God’s self known. The Psalmist puts it this way, “show the light of
your countenance”.
Although they are desperate, there also seems to be a lot
of HOPE in their plea: They know God is their God. they are God’s people, and they are hopeful
that God will, in fact, respond. And
God does
respond to God’s people…over and over again. And, over and over, the people
are strengthened…for a while, but
then they fall away. (BTW that’s
pretty much a brief summary of the rest of the Hebrew Scriptures, if not God’s
relationship with God’s people in general!)
As we think of what those newly
returned exiles asked for in Isaiah: For God to intervene in their plight, for God to forgive them and show up
in their lives, we as Christians can
see the coming of Jesus as a new kind
of intervention. In fact, it’s God’s ultimate
intervention: God becomes flesh and
dwells among us as a human being. It
is through this Human Being, who is also God, we see the light of God’s
countenance. We are
fully forgiven and given relationship with the One who made us and forms
us—the potter of our clay.
At this time when our world and
lives are dark on many fronts…With war and tumult, greed and scapegoating, crumbling
economies, inequity, injustice, bankrupt and addicted nations and people, a
government apparently unable to value the Common Good over partisan politics, and
so many natural disasters that leave unspeakable and overwhelming destruction…We are seeing these things take place RIGHT
NOW! As those before us have seen
these things.
In the Gospel Jesus says, when we see these signs, we can know
that Jesus is near…Just as when we see a plant putting on new shoots, we know that summer is near. It’s a natural
part of God’s plan. Now this nearness of Jesus is not just referring to some cosmic End Time, it is also talking about right
now…in the midst of our darkness, in
the midst of the many signs we do indeed
see taking place today. And so as we see the signs, as those before us saw
signs, we can live in faithful HOPE: Jesus is
near, and God will bring the LIGHT NOW…In this time in-between Jesus’ coming to earth as a child and when he comes
again in the End Time. It’s a natural part of God’s plan… So we must KEEP ALERT
right now, because in the midst of the darkness of our world, a light
will shine. God will try to intervene again—Right now, today/tonight/tomorrow.
Jesus said to those closest to him, “What I say to you, I say to all, “Keep
alert”.
We must realize that we are part of
the “all” Jesus is talking about. So it’s our job to WATCH, WAIT, and KEEP ALERT, because the LIGHT, which is Jesus’ nearness, may very well surface in the
most unexpected ways and times, and we
don’t want to miss it! Instead, we want to BE READY to recognize just how
God intervenes in our darkness…and to name it for ourselves and others.
As we begin our 5th year
together, remember God’s nearness will probably come in the most unexpected
ways…
Like a child’s innocent question, a
grace that may come in the midst of pain and loss, a new path that opens when
another is blocked, deep values that galvanize when finances get really tight, or
perhaps recognizing we’re not alone after all, but part of a community that’s
become a holy family for us.
No matter where we are physically
or spiritually, Advent is the time to live in HOPE and EXPECTATION….WATCH!
WAIT! BE ALERT for all those times when Jesus is near, when he shows us the light of his countenance, when God
intervenes and brings the LIGHT. Amen.
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