“Advent’s Triple Promise”

Three aspects of Christ’s coming into the world are celebrated during this Advent season.  First, we rejoice that God came into the world in the form of the baby born at Bethlehem.  That is the part of Christmas that everyone recognizes.  Second, we celebrate our present experience of God coming to us and renewing our lives.  And third, we look forward to a future, unknown time when Christ will come again and God will break into human history with the promised kingdom.

Thus, the focus of Advent is the triple coming of Christ:  in history, in Grace, and at the end of time.  The name of the season itself is derived from the two Latin words; ad, which means “to or toward” and venire, which means

“to come”.  Thus Advent, “to come to”.  To tell the truth that is about all I can remember from three very challenging years of studying Latin in high school.

All three aspects of Advent emphasize preparedness; the preparation of the prophets and of John the Baptist for the coming of Jesus, our own preparedness in the present through participation and repentance, and our preparedness for the return of Christ through our prayers, our actions, and our proclamation.

Some are surprised that the liturgical color for Advent is purple for both repentance and for royalty.  Some even call Advent our Winter Lent.  My mother strongly resisted the themes of Advent.  She far preferred the

cheer and good will of Christmas and would chastise me for using the Advent hymns written in minor keys for the Sundays leading up to Christmas.  “We have enough sadness already,” she would say.  “No need to dwell on it.”

For me, I still see the preparedness of Advent as a kind of “making room for the One who is to be born.”  I enjoy quiet times, time to read, to study, to pray.  Here on the Cape I enjoy late afternoon walks on Corporation Beach, a place where I often feel the presence of God in the sheen of the quiet water, the swoop of gulls’ wings, or a glistening late fall sunset.  I invite all of us to consider in this Advent time who we are and how we might participate in the triple promises of Advent.

Today our culture puts all the emphasis on rejoicing in the birth of Jesus.  Should we have a visitor from outer space, I doubt that he or she would connect what they saw with this sacred event.  I think that part of the challenge of being the church is to help us with the other two aspects of Advent.  How do we celebrate our present experience of God coming to us and renewing us in our lives right now?

In our present cramped quarters I see many of the activities of the church each day.   Certainly we could

cite Sunday morning worship, the sacraments of the Lord’s Supper and Baptism, the participation of our many choirs, the activities of Sunday school classes and youth groups, meetings of Alcoholics Anonymous, Bible and other study groups, visitation at homes, hospitals, nursing and assisted living homes, the teams that fold bulletins and mail news letters, the activities of Servac and Women’s Fellowship, the work of all the boards and committees, the Dress-A-Live-Doll, overnights of hospitality, and other programs to assist needy persons.  The list is daunting, isn’t it.  And I know this is only part of what we do.  Even as we speak our mission team is building houses in Guatemala and soon others of us will be leaving for New Orleans.  Mission assistance in Honduras is on going.

All of this and more makes real and extends the presence of God in our lives and the lives of others.  And this is merely naming some of the overt ministries of the church.  Just consider the thousands of personal deeds of kindness, the depth and breadth of which only God can know in full.

Perhaps the third promise of Advent is the one we talk about the least, the promise of a day when Christ will return.  Jesus describes this time in disturbing detail in the 24^th chapter of Matthew.  The description is ominous

indeed. 

The verses we heard this morning make it clear that we are urged to active watching and waiting, something which most of us know is very hard to do.  Jesus reminds us that this day will be much like the day when the flood waters swept across the earth and no one besides Noah himself had thought to prepare.  I believe that Jesus is really urging us to live always as though the end of our days were here.

He warns, “Keep awake therefore, for you do not know at what hour your Lord is coming.”  This is much like the plea of David in Psalm 25:

Make me to know your ways, O Lord;

Teach me your paths.

Lead me in your truth, and teach me,

For you are the God of my salvation;

For you I wait all the day long.

It is a promise that is meaningless to all who see no wrong in the world as it is, to all who believe with all their

heart that those who suffer deserve their own misfortune.  But for all who experience a depth of restlessness and a sense that the world is not as it

should be, then the promises of Advent are the one hope of the world.

My own Advent journey this year began yesterday at Tremont Temple in downtown Boston as I attended the 38^th annual production of Langston Hughes’ Black Nativity.  This hour and a half gospel song-play with 100 voices of adults and children tells the good news of Jesus’ birth through a lens of black experience.  For me one of the most moving aspects of the experience is the way in which there are no visible disciplinary issues with the children.  They know what a privilege it is to be part of all this and they simply rise to the occasion.  Let me tell you, there were a lot of “cousins” in the audience who would give anything to be included.

The prophet Jeremiah spoke to a world broken and shattered of hope.  Their magnificent temple was destroyed and they were driven from their homeland.  They had rested all their hope on the physical aspects of restoration, but Jeremiah prophesied a new kind of hope.  His was a hope not based upon the restoration of buildings, but rather on the presence of God to us in all

times and circumstances.  That is the only true basis of hope for us all.

Jeremiah promised that a righteous branch would spring forth from David and carry out righteousness and justice in all the land.  As Christians, we claim that righteous branch in Jesus the Christ, the hope of the world.

Tomorrow night our book group will discuss Greg Mortenson’s book, Three Cups of Tea.  This is a true story which takes place in the remote mountains of Pakistan.  In the past decade and a half Greg has been building schools for girls in Pakistan, one school at a time.  He has worked in the same areas as the Taliban, the same areas where Osama Bin Laden is reported to have been hiding.  Greg Mortenson is a peace builder for our time, understanding that one of the most powerful ways to

oppose terrorism is to enable isolated persons to get a true education.  I believe that his work and the work of his Central Asia Institute are just one example of how one person can make a difference in this very complex world that we inhabit.

I can only speak for myself, but I know that I yearn for the fulfillment of all the promises of Advent:

I yearn for the birth of our Savior who is Christ the Lord.  I yearn for the presence of God in our lives together.  And I yearn for the fulfillment of righteousness in the time to come.

As I read a portion of a prayer/poem by J. Barrie Shepherd, let us anticipate the presence of Jesus in the meal we are about to share:

In this day now before us, Lord,

show me the moments and the spaces

where I may fail to see the child, hear its call.

That  hand that reaches out toward mine,

that impulse, all too easily discarded, to break through

the deadly isolation of my needs, my hopes, my fears,

and listen to and really hear the problems,

possibilities, of another human life.

As I move across these weeks

toward the manger, Lord, make real for me,

not just your presence as my guide, but also

my companions on the journey.

Unite me to the company of all my fellow pilgrims as we sing the songs and share this meal

of anticipation and hope.

Shalom and Amen.

Rev. Kathleen S. Henry

Dennis Union Church

First Sunday of Advent

December 2, 2007