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There
is Hope! There are many dimensions to the fullness of life, and sadness is certainly one of them. If we love, we will surely come to a time of sadness. In the larger world we see all kinds of suffering, and if we allow ourselves to keep caring, there is the potential for great pain there. And in an unusually significant world event, there is the grieving, suffering and fear involved in the horrific events of September 11th. Why these topics in such a joyful season? Why misery on the Third Sunday of Advent? Well, let me address another question first. Question: Why do we do it? Why do we fight the fight of Advent every year? Why do we delay the hanging of the greens, and the reds and the candy canes every December, while our neighbors delight in dressing up their homes and yards with the most gorgeous of Christmas symbols, lights and cheer? The homes of many Episcopalians continue dark, or at least normal lighting, until perhaps the fourth week of Advent. Why do we do this? Surely it is not to delay Christmas, or to minimize the joy of Christmas. But in fact, it is to preserve and to experience the fullness of Advent. In this one brief season of the Church Year we hear the lessons of hope, joy, expectation, majesty, the coming of Christ as a little baby, the second coming of Christ at the end of the world, trust, patience, waiting. And more. These are rich and vital elements of the fullness of life, and this season of Advent, a tradition for fifteen hundred years in the Anglican Communion, makes a time and a place for us to explore and even experience them. One of the major themes of Advent is hope. Hope, you may remember from St. Paul, is trust in things not seen. Hope is faith. Advent gives us time to explore the possibility of applying patient hope to various realities of our daily existence. To illness and grieving, to relationships and job opportunities. Hope is the currency of the faithful and it can make us rich beyond earthly wealth. Those are some of the reasons we work to preserve the richness of this holy season of Advent. So why, then, sadness and death here on the third Sunday of Advent? Something we are likely to forget each December is that Advent is about TWO events called the Coming of the Christ into the world: one, the arrival of the baby Jesus, which moves many hearts to welcome the love of God once again. It is the opportunity to strengthen and refresh our consciousness of God's presence among us. The second Coming of the Christ into the world is just that: the Second Coming. That is not only about the Kingdom of God finally taking over everything and everyone, and finally making it all good; there is the theological possibility of the death that will precede that fullness of life with God, what some call Judgment Day. And it reminds us that we are mortal. We all will die, sooner or later. It is that realization that can put life in perspective. How many times have we heard in recent months about the resurgence of spiritual awareness that has been brought about by the death and destruction of the World Trade Center and Pentagon tragedies? Only this past Friday, Roman Catholics around the world, one billion of them, were called upon by their spiritual leader to fast--to go without food --in order to contemplate with increased clarity those tragic events and their implications. For it is not New Yorkers alone who have suffered this great loss, nor Washingtonians. As the rector of Trinity Church on Wall Street, Dan Matthews, said on the first Sunday afterwards, "Dust, everywhere. Everywhere, everywhere, dust. Everything was covered in dust. It was unbelievable. We couldn't imagine how the whole southern part of Manhattan Island could be covered in dust...But the dust did not just fall in the southern tip of Manhattan. The dust fell all over the world on September 11th. Not one inch of the earth is without dust...everybody is covered with the dust of the World Trade Center." I heard a story yesterday on National Public Radio that comes from the Islamic tradition. I missed the first part of the story but I caught the punch line, which was: "There are two teachers, the speaking one and the silent one. The speaking one is the Koran; the silent one is death." Wow. An awareness of our own death is not such a bad thing. We may not want to carry this awareness with us right up in front of our lives. It can ride, perhaps, in the back seat of our life, or on the back burner, or we can even tow it, way behind ourselves. What is important is to have it -- an awareness of our own death that will come someday -- have it somewhere around so that once in a while we can take it into account when making decisions, when deciding how to deal with others - when forming and reforming our values and priorities -- yes, an awareness of our own death can enrich our lives. And so our ancient season of Advent is about the fullness of life and it is about the reality of death. It is about waiting and patience. It is also about joyful hope. Joyful hope despite our awareness of death? Yes. Joyful hope. Joy, you know, is different from happiness. Joy is a quiet strength way down deep that only God can give us. It is not dependent on events or even on the absence of suffering or fear. One of my seminary professors had had a terrible personal loss some years before I met him. He used to say, "I have been to the bottom and it is solid." There is a quiet joy resting deep within. That joy is integrally connected with hope. We see signs of hope all around us. Gathering for worship with others who hope, we see those who have been in darkness and now rejoice; who have been with their backs to the wall and now stride forward. The very community of worship is hope. Advent is, most of all, a time to rest in hope, to "bed down in hope." To take the time to hope, before we see how things come out. Sometimes it is just better to be halfway there, as we are on this sixteenth of December, than to get to the finish line. To appreciate where we have been and what we have learned, and to know our need, our thirst, our hunger for what surely lies ahead. We are blessed and we know it. And we wait, in trust, for the fulfillment promised to us. All the joys of Christmas, of Christ coming into the world, and of the promise of everlasting life, are based on what we call a "sure and certain hope." The greatest gift we ever receive is the gift of hope. It cushions all jolts and it lights all dark spaces. In this Advent time, then, let us keep moving forward but ever so slowly, as we experience this treasure of expectation, anticipation and above all, hope Amen Copyright 2001 The Rev. William A. Kolb Gospel
Reading: Luke 1:46b-55
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