Advent 2

Text: Isaiah 40:1-11

Comfort, comfort my people,
says your God.
Speak tenderly to Jerusalem,
and proclaim to her
that her hard service has been completed,
that her sin has been paid for,
that she has received from the Lord’s hand
double for all her sins.

A voice of one calling:
“In the wilderness prepare
the way for the Lord;
make straight in the desert
a highway for our God.
Every valley shall be raised up,
every mountain and hill made low;
the rough ground shall become level,
the rugged places a plain.
And the glory of the Lord will be revealed,
and all people will see it together.
For the mouth of the Lord has spoken.” 

A voice says, “Cry out.”
And I said, “What shall I cry?” 

“All people are like grass,
and all their faithfulness is like the flowers of the field.
The grass withers and the flowers fall,
because the breath of the Lord blows on them.
Surely the people are grass.
The grass withers and the flowers fall,
but the word of our God endures forever.”

You who bring good news to Zion,
go up on a high mountain.
You who bring good news to Jerusalem,
lift up your voice with a shout,
lift it up, do not be afraid;
say to the towns of Judah,
“Here is your God!”
See, the Sovereign Lord comes with power,
and he rules with a mighty arm.
See, his reward is with him,
and his recompense accompanies him.
He tends his flock like a shepherd:
He gathers the lambs in his arms
and carries them close to his heart;
he gently leads those that have young.

Reflection

I have never experienced an earthquake, and I hope I never do – but there are millions of people around the world who have gone through the devastating impact of the earth literally moving beneath their feet. An earthquake is no less than a earth-shattering event. It drastically alters everything. In particularly bad earthquakes, buildings are reduced to rubble. Lives are lost. The world is undone.

In today’s text, Isaiah speaks of a world undone. Of mountains being laid low and valleys being raised up. Of the crooked being made straight. He speaks of nothing less than an earth-shattering event. But here, unlike in an earthquake, the reversal of fortune is a good thing.

The people of Israel had known great misfortune throughout their history. They had endured slavery, violence, oppression, captivity. They experienced deep grief, deep lament, and deep anger. Their world had come undone time and again – even as they had willingly deviated from God’s parameters and faced the consequences.

As we’ve moved through the Hebrew Bible over these last few months, we’ve heard the story of God’s people – of promise, of sin, of oppression, of forgetting what it means to worship God. We’ve seen what happens when God’s people go terribly astray.

And yet, all along the way, even as doom and gloom bears down on God’s people, there is always grace. God’s final words are never words of hopelessness, death, or destruction. They are always words of hope. They are always words of new life. They are always words of restoration.

Today, I’m thinking about those who have entered into this season of Advent with deep grief. I’m thinking about those who have lost loved ones and are facing this time of year for the first time without them. I’m thinking about those who have been cut off from their families. I’m thinking about children who are without their parents. I’m thinking about those who are facing violence and upheaval. I’m thinking about all those who have gone through or are going through earth-shattering experiences.

For many, this Advent season, it feels like the earth is moving underneath their feet, and all they know is falling away or being reduced to rubble. We cannot and should not try to skip through these seasons of grief and darkness when they come. But this text reminds us that grief and darkness are not the last word. God gives us a promise that one day, things will be different. One day, the darkness will turn to light. One day, we will, in fact, experience the fullness of the good news.

Jan Richardson, an artist, writer, and United Methodist minister knows what it is to experience grief after losing her husband during Advent in 2013. She writes,

“Comfort, O comfort my people, we hear God cry out in an Advent text from Isaiah (40:1). If, in this life, I cannot do away with grief, then I pray that I will at least enter into it with a heart open to this comfort, this solace that is one of the greatest treasures God offers us in the landscape of this season. This comfort is no mere pablum, no saccharine wish. And though it is deeply personal, it is not merely that; solace does not leave us to our own solitude. True comfort opens our broken heart toward the broken heart of the world and, in that opening, illuminates a doorway, a threshold, a connection. It reveals to us a place where, in the company of heaven and earth, we can begin anew, bearing forth the solace we have found” (This Luminous Darkness: Searching for Solace in Advent and Christmas).

May the words of Isaiah speak comfort and hope to you here and now, especially if you or someone you love are struggling with grief this Advent season.

Ponder

o   What words, phrases, or images from the text speak to you? What thoughts or feelings do they evoke?
o   Where are you experiencing grief or struggle presently?
o   How do you move through and with grief?

Challenge

Maybe this is a difficult season for you that overwhelms with all of the expectations, all of the people, all of the cultural noise around Christmas. Cultivate space in your life. Make time for silence, for prayer, for working with your hands. Make time for a meal with a loved one. Perhaps seek out a counselor if you need help processing your grief. Disengage from all of the extra noise. You don’t have to buy into it.

And/or

Notice those around you who may be having a difficult time. Don’t force cheerful words upon them. Be with them in their struggle. You don’t need the right words. Just be present. Share a meal, write a card, be with them. Allow them to speak to their grief if they need to.

Prayer 

Lord Jesus Christ, you are the Man of Sorrows. You know grief and suffering. Walk with me as I struggle. Be with me in the darkness. And even in the darkness, may I experience sparks of your light this Advent season. In Jesus’ name I pray. Amen.

-Cindy+

Advent 1

Text: Jeremiah 33:14-18

“‘The days are coming,’ declares the Lord, ‘when I will fulfill the good promise I made to the people of Israel and Judah.

“‘In those days and at that time
I will make a righteous Branch sprout from David’s line;
he will do what is just and right in the land.
In those days Judah will be saved
and Jerusalem will live in safety.
This is the name by which it will be called:
The Lord Our Righteous Savior.’

For this is what the Lord says: ‘David will never fail to have a man to sit on the throne of Israel, nor will the Levitical priests ever fail to have a man to stand before me continually to offer burnt offerings, to burn grain offerings and to present sacrifices.’”

Reflection

This text for the first Sunday of Advent is short and sweet. In it, the prophet Jeremiah speaks these hope-filled words of God – words of promise that God’s people do, in fact, have a future. As Christians, we read these words as ones that anticipate the coming of Jesus Christ, God in the flesh. As Christians, we have the gift of hindsight. But Jeremiah? Jeremiah writes these words in the midst of what looked like an impossible situation.

The previous chapter sets the scene. In it, we learn that Jeremiah is being imprisoned by Zedekiah, who was the king of Judah, the southern kingdom. At the same time, the Babylonian Empire, the most powerful empire yet to be seen, was in the midst of laying siege on Jerusalem. Things were not looking good. Jeremiah knew what had happened to the northern kingdom of Israel when Assyria came in and took them captive, and the ten northern tribes had been essentially scattered to the winds. Jeremiah had been warning Zedekiah of Judah’s impending similar fate, which angered the king and consequently led to his captivity.

As Jeremiah was held in confinement, Judah’s fall was imminent. The people would be expelled from the land. They would be driven into exile.

And then a strange thing happens. A relative of Jeremiah comes to him with a proposition – to buy the field at Anathoth. God tells Jeremiah to do so. Jeremiah does. So what’s so strange about this transaction?

Remember, Jerusalem is currently besieged by the most powerful empire they’d yet seen. The city’s fall was all but inevitable at this point. Why in the world would Jeremiah invest in property that was about to be lain to waste? It would be like someone saying in the midst of the Syrian civil war, “I think I’d really like to invest in property in Aleppo.” Or maybe like someone else saying, “Gaza is where I’d like to buy land.” It just makes no sense given the current reality of violence and destruction in those regions.

But Jeremiah buys the field and takes the deed to the land and preserves it in a clay jar. Then he awaits the utter destruction of Jerusalem and of the kingdom of Judah at the hands of Babylon.

To buy the field is an act of complete trust and hope in God’s grace. It is to look squarely in the face that which seems to be the end of the world and to say, “God’s not done with us yet.” It is to see that the death that is surely coming is not the last word. And so, Jeremiah’s act of buying the field leads us into these words of hope in Jeremiah 33:14-18. The fall of Jerusalem and Judah is not, in fact, the end for God’s people!

This passage reminds us that God’s grace is always at work. It reminds us that God’s work is never finished. It reminds us that God is never, ever, done with God’s people. Even when it feels like there is no hope, like death is closing in, or like there is no escape from the darkness and brokenness we are experiencing, God gives life.

Jeremiah trusts so fully in this promise that he invests in land that is about to be destroyed. He sees life, even when faced with death. I don’t know about you, but I long to be able to see with Jeremiah’s eyes, and to trust with Jeremiah’s heart. I long to be able to have that kind of unreserved faith in the promises of God.

This season of Advent that we are entering into is a season where we look expectantly to the promises of God in Jesus Christ. I challenge you to look to those promises with the eyes and the heart of Jeremiah.

Ponder

o   What words, phrases, or images from the text speak to you? What thoughts or feelings do they evoke?
o   Where, in your life, have you or are you struggling to find hope?
o   Where have you witnessed God’s faithfulness in your life?
o   What words do you need to hear from God today?

Challenge

Acquaint yourself with the practice of the Ignatian Examen. You can find many resources online, but here is one simple one: https://jesuits.org/Assets/Publications/File/The_Daily_Examen.pdf Each day this week, consider these two questions before going to bed: When, today, did I feel most disconnected from God? When, today, did I feel most aware of God’s grace?

And/or

Think of someone in your life who might need some encouragement – someone who might need to be reminded of God’s promises. Write a card, give a phone call, take them out for coffee, go visit. Remind them that God has more for them.

Prayer

God, you are the one who speaks life in the midst of death. You are the one who brings light in the midst of darkness. You are the one who brings healing in the midst of brokenness. Speak life, and light, and healing into my life and into the lives of those around me. Help me to utterly trust in your promises through Jesus Christ. In Jesus’ name I pray. Amen.

-Cindy+