Happy New Year! Of course, what
I mean by that is that we are in the Season of Advent, the beginning of a new
church calendar year, the means by which we tell the story of Jesus with the
calendar. “Advent,” is the Latin word for “coming,” and the Season begins four Sundays
before Christmas, and on the first Sunday, we light the “candle of hope on
the Advent wreath.
Have you ever had to get
dressed in the dark before the sun had risen, perhaps because you didn’t want
to wake someone up, only to find out later that your shirt was inside out or
backwards, or, you had put the wrong clothes on? In
today’s Advent Reading from Romans 13:11-14, this is exactly what Paul is describing, getting dressed for hope in darkness that he describes this way...
12The night is nearly over; the day is almost here…
It’s almost day, but it looks like it’s still night. He does not say, “the day is nearly over; the night is almost here…” No, the night is nearly over… This distinction changes everything, including what kind of clothes you put on!
What do we call the time of day, when night is almost over and the day is almost here? We call it, twilight. It is an in-between time, or, a “liminal” time. We could say, it is “already but not yet.”
 |
Does twilight occur in the morning or in the evening? That is a trick question, because the answer is “both.” As you see in this image, it happens both when the sun is going down at night and when the sun is coming up in the morning. The approach of morning looks the same as the approach of night. We often call the morning twilight, “dawn,” and the evening twilight, “dusk.”
So, how do you know whether it is dawn or dusk? This may seem quite simple, but if you are disoriented as to what time it is, it can be hard to tell! For example, I remember being very sick and sleeping for three straight days in the middle of winter and when I got up to go the bathroom, I could not tell whether it was morning or night. This can also happen with jet lag. In those times, we must discern: do we put on our pajamas for bed, or do we put on clothes for school or work? (That said, I observe nowadays that students sometimes wear their pajamas to school! 😊)
How do we know what time it is? Clock? Watch? Hourglass? Angle of the sun, or stars? Advent reminds us what time it is. Advent reminds us that the twilight we are in, this darkness, is not dusk, but dawn, and this changes everything.
Advent means “coming,” specifically, that God is coming. We look at God’s coming in three ways: First, we look back to God coming to us in Jesus and reflect on that; secondly, we look ahead to Christ’s future return and the hope that our “swords will be turned to ploughshares,” as our Old Testament reading from Isaiah tells us.[1] Imagine! All the resources, money, and energy that we currently invest in military spending, will be invested into farming so that there is food for all the people of the world! The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute think tank estimates that just 10 percent of the annual military budget of the world’s superpowers such as the US, China, Russia, would be enough to end global poverty and hunger within 15 years… it would be enough to house, feed, clothe, and educate every person on earth. [2] Does that fill you with longing? Finally, in light of these first two “comings,” we watch for how Christ is coming to us now, continually, today, everyday, right here.
In a culture that does not know how to wait, Advent teaches us to resist hurry. The modern Advent wreath as we know it was invented by a German Protestant pastor, Johann Wichern who was a pioneer in urban mission work among the poor during the 19th century. He had founded a school in Hamburg, and during Advent, the children would ask daily with regards to Christmas, “Are we there yet?”
So, he built this large wooden ring, made from an old cartwheel with 20 small red and 4 large white candles. A small candle was lit successively every weekday and Saturday during Advent. On Sundays, a large white candle was lit. The custom gained ground among Protestant and Catholic churches in Germany and evolved into this smaller wreath with four or five candles as we have today.
So how does this all relate to the darkness? Well, let me be frank with you. We are all going to die, (with the exception of the generation that is alive at Christ’s return).[3] I was reminded of this on a morning walk this week after a big storm “blow-down.” The sidewalks were caked with leaves and the sweet smell of death was everywhere, and it reminded me of this eventuality of death for us. And, if you do not die first, you will experience many “mini-deaths” beforehand. A pet will die. A loved one will die, a parent, a brother or sister, or spouse. Even children die. Other kinds of death occur. A season will end. Someone will leave the church. A friend will move away. A child will move out from home. A sickness. Dementia. You name it. My mom, who will be soon 90, has lost so many friends and colleagues, and only three years ago, she lost her best friend and life partner, my father. Yes, you will eventually lose everything, including your own health, your breath, your heartbeat. The Bible calls this, “the reign of death,” “darkness,” or “night time.”
But, in the middle of this night when it seemed like it could get no darker, there was a gleam of light. Twilight. A teenage girl received an announcement that she would conceive and bear a child, and his name would be called, “Immanuel, God with us.” And like us, he was born of a woman and grew up in a world of darkness and death. Like us, he suffered, and like us, he died, but unlike us, he rose from the dead, not metaphorically or spiritually, but literally and physically. Love conquered hate. Mercy conquered judgment. Forgiveness conquered revenge. Twilight came to the human race, a gleam of light. This is the message of Advent. It is not dusk, it is dawn. Like him, we will also rise, and death will die.
The long night of death is
nearly over… the new day of resurrection is almost here and that changes
everything. And, when you believe that, it changes everything for
you. It changes what kind of “clothes” you will put on every day, and
how you will “dress.” You will dress for hope, not for despair. Paul wrote:
11 And do this, understanding the present time: the hour has already come for you to wake up from your slumber, because our salvation is nearer now than when we first believed. 12 The night is nearly over; the day is almost here. So let us put aside the deeds of darkness and put on the armour of light. 13 Let us behave decently, as in the daytime, not in carousing and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and debauchery, not in dissension and jealousy. 14 Rather, clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ, and do not think about how to gratify the desires of the flesh[4]
Paul exhorts us to take off the “clothing meant for night time,” that is, “clothing” for death that numbs and medicates our despair, boredom, and emptiness. This includes behaviours such as sexual and chemical addictions, living in a virtual world of fantasy, living in continual dissension as we see in our current culture wars, silos, and echo chambers. Rather, he exhorts us to put on clothes born out of the hope that morning is almost here. We clothe ourselves with the Lord Jesus, immersing ourselves in him and his unfailing love, dressing for hope in the darkness of twilight. We put on gratitude, patience, compassion, gentleness, and kindness, making it our life-long quest to love well, to love better, and to finish well. Wake up, wake up, wake up! It is not dusk, it is dawn. The day is almost here! “May the God of hope fill you with hope… so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.”[5]
Acknowledgements: I found the twilight graphic while browsing but now can't find the source. If you know this, please let me know and I will give credit. Wickern image was found on Wikipedia at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann_Hinrich_Wichern.
