Advent Week 4: Love

Week 4 | Love

By this point in our Advent season, you may be tired.  Maybe even a little bored.  The traditions and the candles and the to-do lists and the shopping and the cleaning and the cooking and the cleaning after the cooking and that one song that you’re certain you’ve heard eighty million times that annoyingly gets stuck in your head and just when you think you’ve gotten it out, you hear it again and it’s right back in there running its circular track somewhere near your hippocampus.  It’s all gotten a little too familiar.

And familiarity can be a helpful tool.  Navigating the world would be immeasurably more difficult if we didn’t develop those shortcut stories that our brains use to tell us, “That’s my friend Josh from the coffee shop,” or “This is a safe route I’ve walked on before,” or “When the flame is on, the pan on the stove gets hot, and I should not touch it.”

But familiarity kills wonder.  And perhaps we’ve gotten so familiar with certain seasonal mechanics in our celebration of Christmas that we’ve begun to lose the wonder of its essence.

If you have even the slightest familiarity with the gospel, you already know that the center of this whole story is love. God is love.  God loves us.  We exist to love God and love others.

And when you think about it, that is absolutely bonkers.  It’s wonderful.

So I invite you to join me in an imaginative space of wonder.  To discover that Jesus, love incarnate, is present, not just in the manger or on the cross or in His future coming to restore and redeem all of creation, but also in the present moment.  With us.  With me.  With you.  

And may we in turn recognize that our presence in this place, in this city, in this very moment, is for the purpose of receiving that Love and reflecting it back out in others-focused self-giving ways. That the reality of God dwelling among us, moving into the neighborhood, moves us beyond familiarity to the wonder of participation in that active sacrificial expression of love in the world.

— Kala

Historical Reading

“Love is contrasted with wrath and indignation, and by it all bitterness is expelled from our hearts. Love is full of the sweetest fruits. What Paul started to say in the previous chapter he now develops more fully, so whoever made the chapter divisions in Ephesians got it wrong here. Paul encourages us to love by giving us the example of God and Christ. By the Holy Spirit we have been made children of God, and it is characteristic of children that they follow the behavior of their father. The Father is love and declared his great love toward us when he sent his Son to die for us. With the same degree of love, the Son voluntarily embraced us, and following the will of his Father, he gave himself up to the punishment of the cross. Therefore if the Son and the Father loved us that much, it is only right that we should love one another equally strongly.”
— Heinrich Bullinger, Commentary on Ephesians (16th Century)

Prayer

O Lord, let your grace and your love do for us what fear of your terrors alone cannot.
Melt our hearts by that nobler principle, and teach us to despise everything that would displease you.
Let our hearts respond with the same kind of compassion that motivated you, Jesus, to serve the poor.
And whenever we do make mistakes, let us err on the side of compassion—a love that would never harm the worst sinner—much less the least and weakest of God’s servants.
We consecrate our lives to you, Lord, even to death. We will not then feel the bitterness of death half so much, when our hearts are ablaze with a zeal for your glory.
Amen.

— Philip Doddridge (18th Century)

Advent Week 3: Joy

Week 3 | Joy

Is this not the easiest of the Advent themes?  Joy is baked in to the whole ethos of the Christmas season.  It’s hard not to feel happy when watching a favorite holiday movie, dancing to a carol, sharing a special meal, admiring lights and decorations, and the delight of getting exactly what you wished for or giving the perfect gift.  

But the distinguishing nuance of joy is that it lasts beyond the moments of happiness.  It can be present when the shine of Christmas cheer dulls or even tarnishes.  Biblical joy is an attitude that God’s people adopt, not because of happy circumstances, but because of our hope in God’s love and promises.  It is a perspective that is far broader than the fleeting delight that butterfly-like visits briefly, but then is gone.

In the Bible, rejoicing is often paired with thanksgiving. Gratitude is a way of cultivating joy.  Or fertilizing it.  (I may have grown up in a very rural area, but I did not inherit my grandmother’s green thumb, so my agricultural metaphors have their limits.)  But there’s something to reminding ourselves of the unmerited grace of God, the Giver of every good thing, that can produce in us a joy that perseveres in the darkest of circumstances.

And isn’t that the paradox of the Christian joy? That the presence of God with us is true in the midst of sorrow, grief, pain, sickness, and delight.  That is good news worth singing, shouting, and dancing about.

— Kala

Historical Reading

“‘The light of God’s face’ denotes his serene countenance, just as, on the other hand, the face of God seems to us dark and clouded when he shows any sign of anger. This light, by a beautiful metaphor, is said to be lifted up, when, shining in our hearts, it produces trust and hope. It would not be enough for us to be beloved by God, unless the sense of this love came home to our hearts; but, shining on them by the Holy Spirit, he cheers us with true and solid joy. This passage teaches us that those are miserable who do not, with full resolution, repose themselves wholly in God. The faithful, although they are tossed amid many troubles, are truly happy, were there no other ground for it but this, that God’s fatherly countenance shines on them, which turns darkness into light, and, as I may say, quickens even death itself.”
— John Calvin, Commentary on the Psalms (16th Century)

Prayer

My thankful heart with glorying tongue
Will celebrate your name,
Who has restored, redeemed, re-cured
From sickness, death, and pain.
I cried; you seemed to take some pause,
I sought more earnestly.
And in due time you supported me,
And sent me help from high.
Lord, while my fleeting time still lasts,
Your goodness let me tell.
And new experience I have gained,
My future doubts repel.
A humble, faithful life, O Lord,
Forever let me walk;
Let my obedience testify,
My praise lies not in talk.
Accept, O Lord, my simple gift,
For more I cannot give;
What you bestow I will restore,
For of your alms I live.

— Anne Bradstreet (17th Century)

Advent Week 2: Peace

Week 2 | Peace

The biblical concept of peace is an interesting one.  It feels very distinct from our current cultural associations with the word peace.  It isn’t so much a tranquil stream at sunrise, a stillness of mind, or the enlightenment of self actualization that can only come through silent retreats or very complicated yoga exercises and poses.

The Hebrew word for peace is “shalom” which means complete or whole.  When used as a verb it’s to make complete or restore.  This seems to me to be far more active than meditative.  And probably more uncomfortable.  

When we participate in the peace that Jesus demonstrated when, through his death and resurrection, He restored to wholeness the broken relationship between humans and God, we too create peace by taking what is broken and restoring it to wholeness in our lives, our relationships, and in our world.  And that takes humility and patience and vulnerability and growth.

Scott Erickson in Honest Advent points out that the presence of Jesus was, at some point in her first trimester, likely revealed by Mary’s morning sickness. The process of growth doesn’t come from comfort, so let us not be hindered by unease and uncomfortableness of peacemaking.  The presence of God is in the process, not just in its completion.

— Kala

Historical Reading

“Our God is truly ‘the God of peace.’ We are constantly called to peace by God who himself is peace. His calling is not in timidity or weakness or in some show of strength. God is at peace with himself to such a degree that he even allows sins to be committed against him when he could certainly, by the terror of his manifested power and ineffable greatness, force even the unwilling into subjection. But peace of this kind is that of the world, not that of God, whose very nature is peace.”

— Ambrosiaster (4th Century)

Prayer

Precious Lord Jesus! Oh for grace to love you, who have so loved us! You stoop to call such poor sinful people your own, and love them as your own, and consider every thing done for them and done to them as to yourself.

Show my poor heart a portion of that love, that I may love you as my own and only Savior, and learn to love you to the end, as you have loved me and given yourself for me, an offering and a sacrifice to God.

Precious Lord, continue to surprise my soul with the tokens of your love. All the tendencies of your grace, all the evidences of your favor, your visits, your love-tokens, your pardons, your renewings, your morning call, your mid-day feedings, your noon, your evening, your midnight grace.

All, all are among your wonderful ways of salvation, and all testify to my soul that your name, as well as your work, is, and must be, wonderful.

Jesus, you put forth your hand and touched a leper! Deal with me the same way, precious Lord. Though I am polluted and unclean, yet reach down to put forth your hand and touch me also.

Put forth your blessed Spirit. Come, Lord, and dwell in me, abide in me, and rule and reign over me. Be my God, my Jesus, my Holy One, and make me yours forever.

Yes, dearest Jesus, I hear you say that you will be for me, and not for another. So will I be for you. Oh! You condescending, loving God, make me yours, “that whether I live, I may live to the Lord; or whether I die, I may die to the Lord; so that living or dying, I may be yours.”

— Robert Hawker (18th Century)

Advent Week 1: Hope

Week 1 | Hope

Hope seems to me perhaps the most difficult of the Advent themes to muster this year. To bootstrap myself into belief that, despite all the evidence that mounts in my Twitter feed and the AP news wire, there is a better that is assured and I have the privilege of looking forward to.

I think that is the traditional stance on a Christmas hope.  That the Israelites waited for generations for their coming king. That the Christians of the past two millennia have waited in expectation for His return.

Perhaps my hope this year needs to be a bit closer.  I have trouble waiting for the kettle to heat up for my coffee, for the dog to do his business on a rainy walk, for Wednesday nights to see our church family, for pleasant weather to come again, for the widespread distribution of a vaccine to mark the end of the pandemic.  Must I also wait for hope?  

Perhaps this year, the hope is anchored in the promise that God is with me.  Here.  Now.  That the gift of the incarnation means that I don’t have to go it alone.

— Kala

Historical Reading

“You know how it is when some great king enters a large city and dwells in one of its houses; because of his dwelling in that single house, the whole city is honored, and enemies and robbers cease to molest it. Even so is it with the King of all; He has come into our country and dwelt in one body amidst the many, and in consequence the designs of the enemy against mankind have been foiled and the corruption of death, which formerly held them in its power, has simply ceased to be. For the human race would have perished utterly had not the Lord and Savior of all the Son of God, come among us to put an end to death.” 

— Athanasius of Alexandria, On the Incarnation (4th Century)

Prayer

Lord, I would be the most miserable person in the world if my hopes were only in this life. Why? Because I am hopeless without Christ’s righteousness. My life could never be comfortable, and there would be no hope at all of eternal life.

If you denied me that hope, I would be the most miserable one of all. I may be happy without worldly enjoyments, but all things in the world cannot make me happy without this.

So however you treat me in this world, whatever you deny me, Lord, deny me not this. I can be happy without riches and abundance, like Job and Lazarus were. I can be happy even if I am reviled and reproached, as was Christ and his disciples. I can be happy and comfortable in prison, as were Paul and Silas.

But I cannot be happy without the righteousness of Christ.

All the riches, places, or honors on earth will leave me miserable if I am without this. Even if I were rich and needed nothing, without this I would still be wretched and miserable, poor, blind, and naked.

If I had all things that that a person could desire on earth, what good would it do me without Christ’s righteousness?

What would riches do for me, if they came with the wrath of God? What comfort would honor bring me, if I remained a son of perdition or a child of wrath?

What sweetness would there be in pleasure, if I were on the path to everlasting torments?

What miserable comforts and enjoyments are these, without Christ’s righteousness!

Lord, however you deal with me in outward things, whatever you take from me, whatever you deny me—do not deny me Christ! Do not deny me a share in his righteousness! Amen.

— David Clarkson (17th Century)