Suggested Readings: Psalm 80:1-7, 17-19; Mark 13:24-37
As I write this Advent meditation our Belmont community is deeply mourning the tragic shooting death of freshman Jillian Ludwig. I am reminded in the passages assigned for this day that the Advent/Christmas season itself begins in struggle, pain, and uncertainty. The gospel writer speaks of a time of suffering with deliverance coming upon the return of Christ as he gathers his elect from the four corners of the earth. The psalmist prays similarly: “Restore us, O God, let your face shine, that we may be saved.” There is yearning; there is longing for healing and salvation. The word “saved” in Hebrew is “yeshua” from which we get the name Jesus – the one who will bring salvation and healing to the world. We long for his coming – his first and second comings! – to bring peace to our world and relieve us from our suffering and uncertainty.
Many of the Christmas carols we sing each year also remind us that this holy season is not free from pain and struggle: the angels sing a message of “comfort AND joy,” the holy birth takes place in the “bleak” midwinter, the angel Gabriel even tells Mary not to be afraid, the clear implication being that there were things to fear. The third verse of It Came Upon the Midnight Clear describes how those who bear a crushing load are invited to pause beside the weary road and hear the angels sing. Listen to the beauty of its hope-filled story:
And ye, beneath life’s crushing load, whose forms are bending low, who toil along the climbing way with painful steps and slow, Look now! For glad and golden hours come swiftly on the wing. O rest beside the weary road, and hear the angels sing.
As we begin this Advent season, we do so as “aching visionaries” – those whom philosopher Nicholas Wolterstorff says have caught “a glimpse of God’s new day, who ache with all their being for that day’s coming, and who break out in tears when confronted with its absence… they are the ones who realize that in God’s realm there is no one hungry, and who ache whenever they see someone starving…they are the ones who realize that in God’s realm there is neither death nor tears, and who ache whenever they see someone crying tears over death.” These aching visionaries have a vision of what God intends, and yet they live in the brokenness of today.
I am one of them . . . and I’m guessing you are, too.
Come Lord Jesus.
Susan Pendleton Jones
Susan Pendelton Jones
