toward Advent

The year is moving toward Advent.
Advent is about waiting and longing.

We wait for lots of things...

• the results of the next election
• results of medical tests and/or surgery
• snow
• good news

There are a couple of things that stand out in our world.
People are afraid and exhausted. 

But, as honest an assessment as that is of this moment, it is important to point out that our current political climate - some call it fascism - thrives on these emotions.

One of the strategies of fascism is wearing people down.
So how do we push back? How do we offer an alternative?

During Advent this year I will be offering a series on Revelation 21-22. Waiting for the new heavens and the new earth. This is not escapism - that has nothing to do with biblical Christianity. But waiting for, longing for, hoping for, expecting the fullness of God's Kingdom to continue to break in.

The Old Testament offers an alternative.
Wonder is an antidote to fear.
Read Job 38:1-7 and Psalm 104.
Read them slowly.
Read them out loud. 

Job 38:1-7

The Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind:

"Who is this that darkens counsel by words without knowledge?
Gird up your loins like a man,
I will question you, and you shall declare to me.

"Where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth?
Tell me, if you have understanding.
Who determined its measurements—surely you know!

Or who stretched the line upon it?
On what were its bases sunk,
or who laid its cornerstone
when the morning stars sang together
and all the heavenly beings shouted for joy?"

Psalm 104:1-9, 25, 35b

Praise the Lord, my soul.
Lord my God, you are very great;
you are clothed with splendor and majesty.

The Lord wraps himself in light as with a garment;
he stretches out the heavens like a tent

and lays the beams of his upper chambers on their waters.
He makes the clouds his chariot
and rides on the wings of the wind.

He makes winds his messengers,
flames of fire his servants.

He set the earth on its foundations;
it can never be moved.

You covered it with the watery depths as with a garment;
the waters stood above the mountains.

But at your rebuke the waters fled,
at the sound of your thunder they took to flight;

they flowed over the mountains,
they went down into the valleys,
to the place you assigned for them.

You set a boundary they cannot cross;
never again will they cover the earth.

There is the sea, vast and spacious,
teeming with creatures beyond number—
living things both large and small.

Praise the Lord, my soul.
Praise the Lord.
Hallelujah!

I invite you to recall wonder.
The wonder of new discoveries.
The wonder of the universe.
Let wonder fill your heart and mind and soul.
Breathe in wonder.
Rest in that wonder.

One of the first photographs from the James Webb telescope.