It is Advent. These first weeks of the season aren’t looking ahead to Christmas — not yet. For these first weeks we consider our personal, national and global situations. Too many people are hurting and we can’t close our eyes to their pain and collectively sit on Santa’s lap with our wish lists. Not when members of our family and circle of friends are distressed. Not when families in the parish, where I am currently preaching, still haven’t recovered from hurricane Sandy, over a year ago. Not when I pick up the newspaper and read the front page story and look at a picture of hungry Syrians or typhoon-devastated Filipinos.
On Friday, October 25 (2013), the New York Times had a front-page report that chills and saddens me. At the top of the article was a photo taken from the inside of a Damascus bakery. It showed a few loaves of flatbread, some workers and, peering in through the narrow windows, people looking at the scant supply of bread. Children and parents anxiously hoping to get some bread from the dwindling supplies.
The article spells out the grim details further. “Some 5 million Syrians are refugees in their own country, living hand-to-mouth in vacant buildings, schools, mosques, parks and the cramped homes of relatives.” Others are trapped in their neighborhoods by the conflict, they are afraid to leave their homes. There is a shortage of medical supplies. In addition, the long civil war has caused 2 million Syrians to leave their country. As winter approaches things are only going to get worse.
We need Advent before we slip into Christmas carols. We need its reality check; the world is aching and too many people’s futures look grim. There will be time to stand around the crib and gaze at our hope-made-flesh — but not yet.
Isaiah is our herald opening the season for us. Despite the gloom and our weary spirits he walks us up a high mountain so we can get a good view of our present and future.
Isaiah lived in troubled times, much like our all. Israel (the northern kingdom) had fallen to the Syrians and, before long, it looked like Judah would too. The people lost confidence in God and turned to alliances with other nations. Isaiah tried to convince them that God was their true safety. Today we hear about the hope and security Isaiah offered the people. Jerusalem will be the focus of God’s instruction, and a gathering place for all peoples. There will be war no more, “nor shall they train for war again.”
Who doesn’t want peace? It’s our prayer for ourselves, our families and our world. We want peace, but do we fashion our words and actions to bring about that peace? We might read Isaiah today as a prayer: asking God to fashion our hearts to the prophet’s words, so that we can put down whatever swords and spears we are carrying. Isaiah calls us to attention, a change of heart and a commitment to a new way of living.
We want wars to cease. Do we realize this Advent that we can play a part in building the peaceable kingdom Isaiah envisions? Along with his vision, Isaiah adds a promise, that God will accompany and stay with us until the vision comes to fulfillment. “O house of Jacob, let us walk in the light of the Lord.”
For Advent many parishes will strip the sanctuaries of greenery and decorative hangings. Replacing the festive motif will be a desert-like setting — rocks, sand, leafless branches, etc. People entering church will sense immediately that we are in a different mood or atmosphere for Advent. Something has ended — something is beginning. The way is cleared to evoke reflection and self-examination.
The gospel has a message of urgency. Don’t put off the change and alterations you must make. Time is short and we must act quickly. We mustn’t be fooled into lackadaisical thinking — “eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage.” Those life patterns can swiftly change, even fall apart. Are we ready for such sudden shifts?
Jesus uses an unusual example to wake us up. He likens his coming into our lives to a thief’s breaking into our homes. Have you ever heard a strange sound in your basement, or someone rattling the knob of your apartment door? If you have taken precautions you have nothing to fear. But if not, it’s too late, the intruder may already be in the house!
Who doesn’t like a regular pattern in our life? Getting up with time to feed the children their breakfast and get them ready for school; going to work on time; putting in a good day’s work; arriving home with the shopping done; food cooking on the stove, or heating in the microwave. Jesus warns us not to be lulled into sleepwalking through life. He will break in at the most inconvenient and surprising time.
But suppose he is not a thief who has come to take away? Instead, he is an unexpected intruder who comes, not to do harm, but to rescue us from ourselves. Suppose he breaks into our complacency to shake us awake, help us realize we need to change and then stays with us to bless us and enable us to make those important changes that will give us life?
Jesus’ warning isn’t meant to make us fearful and anxious. We are not like some people who expect Christ’s return at any moment and so go off to the desert, or a mountain to eat, pray and look to the distant horizon for him. Instead, Jesus gives us a vision of a new reality — the in-breaking of his kingdom.
Awakened by the vision, he would have us return to our daily lives. It may feel like the “same old, same old.” But now we will see the over-familiar charged with his presence and the possibility of a new reality, one of justice and peace. It’s what God wants of the world and us; what we are called to help bring about. Christ, the thief, has broken in and everything is changed — for the good.