For from the least to the greatest of them,
everyone is greedy for unjust gain;
and from prophet to priest,
everyone deals falsely.
They have treated the wound of my people carelessly,
saying, “Peace, peace,”
when there is no peace.
Jeremiah 6:13-14 (NRSV)
Survival today requires a healthy dose of skepticism. Too many thieves and charlatans, religious and otherwise, are out there waiting like hungry wolves for defenseless lambs. That old advice, “If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is” is wise counsel in a culture where greed rules supreme. But skepticism takes a terrible toll on our souls. It may save us a few bucks or even a lot of bucks, but it is a debilitating way to live life. And collective skepticism has led us to an age of disenchantment which drains the color and meaning from everything we do.
A skeptical shepherd will never look up at the night-time sky for fear that someone will steal his sheep, and so he may miss an angel with good news of great joy. A skeptical wise man won’t even walk across the street, let alone hundreds of miles to see a Babe in a lowly manger. A skeptical mother and father will never listen to their dreams and visions and thus would never know what it means to become a holy family. Excessive skepticism as a way of life is too high a price to pay for creatures who have only three score and ten years to walk on this earth. So how do we in the church move beyond this age of disenchantment?
UCC minister David Good shared some years ago that Lou Ann Parsons, a retired missionary with the UCC in South Africa, was his church’s missionary-in-residence. She was so short that when she stood behind the pulpit, she could not see the congregation unless she stood on her tiptoes. And like a revelation from on high, Good thought, “That is how we ought to read the Bible. Unless we are on our toes, actively looking for God’s revelations, chances are we won’t have any revelations.” But my question is why stop with the Bible? Why not read a novel or a poem, see a movie or hear a concert, or engage in a conversation or watch the sun rise on our tiptoes?
The New English Version offers a wonderful translation of Luke 3: 15: “The people were on the tiptoe of expectation.” They were ready to hear good news, news which sounded too good to be true. They were ready to risk, to step out on faith, to dare to hope, to lift their eyes from the sod to the stars and to believe that in the deadly stench of Caesar’s empire, something new and liberating could happen. Unless we are on our toes, we may miss the best life has to offer. We may doom ourselves to a lifetime of disenchantment.
This standing on tiptoe reminds us that Advent is about expectation, not passive waiting. Advent is related to our word “adventure,” and there is nothing passive about an adventure. Adventurous expectation, as Presbyterian minister Marc Mullinax reminds us, posts a vigilant watch and prepares for that which is promised. God’s reign can break in at any time, and it is our sacred duty to prepare for a God-shaped destiny.
Years ago, before South Africa was free and when President Mandela was still Prisoner Mandela and apartheid reigned supreme, Archbishop Desmond Tutu stood in front of the South African Embassy in Washington, D.C. and challenged the government with these words:
Those of you inside, are you listening? Do you hear me? You have already been defeated. Do you understand that? You have already lost and we on the outside have won. Out here, we know how this struggle for Black freedom and liberation will turn out, for God is on the side of the oppressed. It’s not, “We shall win.” Oh, no! We have already won! Only you on the inside have not yet realized it. We outsiders have, and we know the future. We are the future.
Tutu was anticipating the freedom promised him. He was willing to bet on God’s promise, and he had faith that such a risk was a wager he would not lose. Advent reminds us that God surely is coming. And the prophets and our passage for today cry out to us, “Don’t let it catch you on the wrong side of God’s justice and shalom.” We are required to stay awake and that is not easy in the dollar-induced dreams spawned by a consumer society that heats up this time of the year. Those with their eyes open will become dissatisfied with a status quo that strives to maintain the old lines of power and privilege–impatient with a culture that discounts a new star in the sky. Instead of chanting in a stupor, “Peace, Peace,” when there is no shalom, no wholeness, or harmony, those who are awake will ask the awesome question, “How can my time and place resemble a place for God to be born in?” And that question will require us to stand on tiptoe and look around us. It will require a faithful imagination on our part. Where can we see God operating in our world? It may be as with Archbishop Tutu, the liberation of a country. It may be the emancipation of a drug-dependent person. Or a planet without war. Or children without hunger, abuse, and poverty. Or Mother Earth with a healed and fertile future. As Mullinax says, the one who cannot imagine anything believes nothing. Belief is the will to imagine God’s ever-near reality breaking into our time and space. “It’s the nervy belief that Mandela will exchange his prisoner’s clothes for a presidential wardrobe,” writes Mullinax.
The adventure of expecting means that we sense we have a choice of available futures. We exercise the gutsy choice to expect to find Jesus in the places where is he usually not found. Advent is an adventure to expect the world of this child and to be accountable to the world in which he is born. This is not the time to kick back and disengage–to slumber while a g1orious dawn is on the horizon. No. This is the time to prepare him room! To hold nothing back. To dare to believe, to risk, to love, to act. It is the time to stand on tiptoe. It is a time to make peace.
(This article is based in part on the writings of Marc Mullinax and David Good in the October-December, 1997 issue of The Living Pulpit, “Advent.”)
Communion
Paul admonishes the church to eat and drink this bread and wine until the Lord comes. Even as we gather around this Table we are told to stand on tiptoes, actively anticipating that time when God’s will shall be done on earth as it is in heaven. Even here we are not allowed the complacency of a hound dog slumbering next to a warm fire. We are reminded that the greatest unveilings of God are yet to be. And we are challenged to live toward that revelation through risky discipleship and awesome love.
Commission
Brazilian theologian Rubem Alves has a wonderful definition of hope and faith. “Hope is hearing the melody of the future. Faith is to dance it.” The other day I saw a young man walking on a sidewalk in Indy. At first, I thought he was high on drugs, but as I got closer, I realized he was listing to music through his earbuds and was dancing to a tune I could not hear. It occurred to me that as followers of Jesus, we hear something the world does not hear. We know the melodies of God’s heart, and we know the future of God’s creation. We have no greater calling than to become colonizers of God’s future in our here and now. So, shall we dance?
Benediction
Go out to prepare the way for the coming of Christ in our world.
Go out to create a world that is a safe place for the baby Jesus and for all children.
Go out and share the gifts of love and peace you have been given with your neighbors.
And may the blessings, mystery, and wonder of this season fill your hearts with joy. Amen.
