E’en So Lord Jesus Quickly Come: Another Advent Begins

This post is adapted from a column I wrote for the December 2010 edition of the Christ Church, Exeter monthly newsletter, "The Anchor"

And so it is Advent, the season of joyful anticipation of the coming of Christ . . . finally!

We need this season, I think, and not simply for the carols and the lights and the trees and the merriment that mark the secular holiday season. We need this season to give us hope in the face of some of the realities of life that could lead us to despair: the young men and women we pray for at Christ Church each Sunday who have died in service to their country in Iraq and Afghanistan;, the brave 6^th grade girl who has endured a stem cell transplant as she fights cancer with the support of her family, parish community, friends, and neighbors; people we know who are out of work and wondering how they will survive when their unemployment benefits run out; and national and global problems that seem too big to solve.

Ironically, it is during this season of deepest darkness in the northern hemisphere that we are invited to look toward the horizon with hope. Advent reminds us that Christ is coming . . . no matter what may be happening in the world or in our lives. Jesus—who was and is and is to come—brings the promise of the future into the present, not so much to fix all that ails our world but to raise our eyes so they can focus beyond today, looking with hope and faith toward the horizon.

When this happens—when we look at the world through the lens of Advent hope—the way we live and the actions we take today are transformed. We are filled with joy and we share that joy with others.

One of my favorite pieces of music during Advent is "E'en so Lord Jesus quickly come" by Paul Manz. The text is an adaptation of Revelation 21:1-4 (adapted by Ruth Manz). This, always, is my prayer for Advent. In the face of darkness and doubt, of uncertainty and isolation, of whatever may be troubling any of us, this is my response.

Peace be to you and grace from him
Who freed us from our sins,
Who loved us all and shed his blood
That we might saved be.

Sing holy, holy to our Lord,
The Lord, Almighty God,
Who was and is and is to come;
Sing holy, holy, Lord!

Rejoice in heaven, all ye that dwell therein,
Rejoice on earth, ye saints below,
For Christ is coming, is coming soon,
For Christ is coming soon!

E'en so, Lord Jesus, quickly come,
And night shall be no more;
They need no light nor lamp nor sun,
For Christ will be their All!

(To truly experience the power of this text, I encourage you to listen to "E'en so Lord Jesus quickly come")

Nurturing an Attitude of Hope

This past weekend I was in Fort Worth and Dallas to lead a seminar and a workshop, each of which focused on what it means to be "church" in the 21st century and how we might redefine our identity and purpose for this "postmodern" era in which we live.

During the workshop at the Episcopal Church of the Transfiguration in Dallas (which is a dynamic and faithful congregation!), I was speaking in the morning about the paradoxes of the culture in which we live. One paradox is that people today feel both empowered and powerless at the same time. We feel empowered because, even as individuals, technology allows us to reach out and influence the world in which we live in ways that we could not have imagined 10-15 years ago. We feel powerless because for all that we can do many of the challenges of our age seem unresolvable. For example, I can change all of the light bulbs in my house to be more energy efficient (thus feeling empowered), but global warming does not appear to be getting any better. In fact, it appears to be getting worse. This disconnect between my actions and the results can easily bring people to a place of despair.

During a break in the morning, a woman who is a member of Transfiguration challenged me on this point. She said, "But our actions do make a difference!" Well, of course, she's right. But the paradox I describe is also right. How can we both be right? Simply put, she is a faithful Christian who participates in a community that proclaims that our actions are a part of a larger purpose, a purpose which God will bring about, even if not in our time and even if we cannot see the results. What she was describing was the perspective of a person who belongs to a faith community. What I was describing is the attitude of someone who does not.

Her comment revealed an important truth about the power of a faith community to shape us. In the context of a community, our actions can lead us to an attitude of hope. Without a faith community, it is much easier to adopt an attitude of despair.

This morning I was reading an excerpt from an interview with Henri Nouwen from 1996. Nouwen said this:

"If you live with hope, you can live very much in the present because you can nurture the footprints of God in your hearts and life. You already have a sense of what is to come. And the whole of the spiritual life is saying that God is right with us, right now. So that we can wait for his coming, and this waiting is a waiting in hope. But because we wait with hope we know that what we are waiting for is already here. We have to nurture that. Here and now matters because God is a God of the present. And God is a God of the present because he is a God of eternity."

We have to nurture this. As a Christian people, as the Church, we need to nurture this attitude of hope so that the world does not fall into despair. We need to proclaim and invite people to participate with us in the world, not to strengthen our pledge base but to shine the light of Christ and nurture an attitude of hope.

Now, there's a sense of purpose!