It orders the stuff, sends the cards, plays the music – I’m free at last to let Argostide make it’s own way! And Advent? Trees in church, carols being sung and Church doing everything it can to make Christmas what it never was because 'Proper churches’, liturgically speaking, don’t do trees, carols and certainly don’t have Jesus in the crib until much nearer the 25th of December. The problem is that if we concentrate too much on Christmas we miss Advent, and that’s a great loss.
So here we are at Advent, the beginning of Year B (Mark to you), using the internet and ever we start with things apocalyptic and dark (yes children it’s all about Him ‘Coming again’) and we start with an old Isaiah who has returned from exile to find the city, the people and the temple (where it all began) in broken and disarrayed pieces. They hadn’t seen God at work for years and Isaiah is calling upon God to ‘do something’ – to be a visible not an invisible influence on and in their lives. "For you have hidden your face from us,” and (a little bit earlier) because God was hidden, he claims, “They sinned!” (So it's your fault then God?)
So what better time to remind us that Jesus comes to this earth as God made man because we asked Him to – to be visible because then we would not sin!
As we, like Isaiah, stand in the fragments, the rubble and detritus of our lives, isn’t this our prayer today also?
Does waiting, the absence of someone and yet the expectation make us better or worse Christians? The great light this same, but younger, Isaiah talks of in ch 9 (people in darkness have seen a great light) is what we look to the East and await, but does this mean we live in darkness, that we wait empty-handed? No – the light is in us and we are the lampstands (middle of the room, not under a bushel).
Which is handy because Paul, writing to the Corinthian church tells us:
“Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. I always thank God for you because of his grace given you in Christ Jesus. For in him you have been enriched in every way - in all your speaking and in all your knowledge - because our testimony about Christ was confirmed in you. Therefore you do not lack any spiritual gift as you eagerly wait for our Lord Jesus Christ to be revealed. He will keep you strong to the end, so that you will be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God, who has called you into fellowship with his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, is faithful."
We lack nothing that we need to be witnesses or to be ‘waiters’ – not at tables (but we should) but for His return! And how do we do this? By being engaged with the Word (written and living) and with the World because of this. We look for the signs, and boy there are times when I do, and we wait ready and expectant (foolish or wise virgin – which are you?). for the day will dawn when Marks words will be fulfilled:
“But in those days, following that distress, ‘the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from the sky, and the heavenly bodies will be shaken.’
At that time men will see the Son of Man coming in clouds with great power and glory. And he will send his angels and gather his elect from the four winds, from the ends of the earth to the ends of the heavens. “Now learn this lesson from the fig tree: As soon as its twigs get tender and its leaves come out, you know that summer is near. Even so, when you see these things happening, you know that it is near, right at the door. I tell you the truth, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away.
No one knows about that day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. Be on guard! Be alert! You do not know when that time will come. It’s like a man going away: He leaves his house and puts his servants in charge, each with his assigned task, and tells the one at the door to keep watch. Therefore keep watch because you do not know when the owner of the house will come back - whether in the evening, or at midnight, or when the rooster crows, or at dawn. If he comes suddenly, do not let him find you sleeping. What I say to you, I say to everyone: ‘Watch!’”
A happy, blesséd and joyous Adventide
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