This past Saturday I helped lead an antiracism workshop at a church in San Francisco. The workshop was based on a workbook entitled Do the Work! written by East Bay activists W. Kamau Bell and Kate Schatz. You can meet the authors and hear them describe the book in a short YouTube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROLxmkqcIQc.

If you watch this video, you might get the impression that the book is less serious than it is. While parts of it are playful (coloring pages, crosswords, etc.), it tackles difficult topics such as privilege, race as a social construct, how to respond when someone makes a racist comment in front of you, and how to respond when you see someone being mistreated or harassed. Still, the tone of the workbook is encouraging, hopeful, and even empowering.

Just a few of many eye-opening lessons from Saturday’s workshop:
1) Of the approximately 20,500 human genes identified by the Human Genome Project, ZERO determine a person’s race. Each human has 3 billion base pairs of genetic letters, and while visible traits are determined by genes, the vast majority of genetic variation exists within what we think of as racial groups, not between them. We’re all 99.9 percent genetically identical. That’s why race is more accurately described as a “social construct” rather than a biological one.
2) Each table group was invited to answer 15 questions that appeared to have come from a civics exam. Even with two lawyers at my table, we couldn’t answer all the questions. When we’d finished, we learned that these 15 questions were part of a 68-question “literacy” test administered to determine whether people were qualified to vote in the State of Alabama in 1965. The county clerk had the (usually racist) discretion to decide whether to ask one question to prove a person was literate, or to require someone to take the entire test in a limited amount of time. Seven wrong answers disqualified a person from voting, and we agreed that most of us surely would have failed it. Although literacy tests like this were banned by the Civil Rights Act in 1965, generations of Black voters were disenfranchised by such tests.
3) We watched a powerful video demonstrating the impact of privilege. A facilitator lines up college students for a race, saying the winner gets a hundred-dollar bill. Before saying “Go!” he has the participants take two steps forward if certain statements apply to them. For example, “Take two steps forward if you had access to a private education,” “…if you never had to worry about your cell phone being shut off, “… if you never had to help Mom or Dad with the bills,” “…if you never wondered where your next meal was coming from.” All these statements are about things that the students themselves have nothing to do with; they didn’t earn them. When the facilitator is finished reading these statements, most of the white kids are many yards ahead of most of the people of color. Folks at the workshop agreed this video isn’t perfect. A few comments thoughtlessly stereotype both the Black and white students, and it’s questionable whether kids of color should be used as object lessons to teach white kids about privilege in the first place. Nevertheless, the lesson is chilling, and brought some folks at our workshop to tears. You can see that video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PJAgPF5FNTQ.
4) Bell and Schatz explain that we each have one or more “lanes” or contexts in which we have more influence than we might realize. Our lane might be a job, a volunteer space, a church, a family, and so on. That lane is where we can begin to do the work of dismantling racism and white supremacy. After answering the question, “What is my lane?” we were invited to answer five more questions: 1) Who else is in it? 2) What’s my role and what are my skills? 3) How does white supremacy show up? 4) What’s being done about it? and 5) What can I do about it? It’s so easy to think, “Well, there’s nothing I can do, just little old me,” but thoughtful consideration of these questions helped us to recognize there really are contexts where we can speak up, where we can help those without voice to have a voice, where we can help the ignored or excluded to be included, and where we can begin to break through the layers of denial that hold racism and white supremacy in place.

The most important lesson, however, is “You don’t have to know everything before you can make a change. You don’t have to do things perfectly to make a change. You just have to be willing to learn, and to try.” [Do the Work! p. 3]

My thanks to Calvary Presbyterian Church in San Francisco for hosting this workshop. I am challenged to do the work!

Lesson: Jonah 3:1-10

I usually blog about the lectionary Gospel passage, but Jonah is one of my favorite books in the Bible. Even people who’ve never opened a Bible know about Jonah and the whale. The story begins with a Hebrew word that many Bibles translate as “Now,” but might also be translated, “And it happened,” or “Now it came to pass.” If it began, “Once upon a time,” or, “A prophet and a person from Nineveh walk into a bar,” we’d know exactly how to read this story. Jonah is something of a hybrid, full of fantasy, humor, and irony. And it ends with God almost saying, “Don’t you get it now, Jonah?”

Jonah never gets it. Nineveh was the capital of Assyria; it’s near where Mosul, Iraq, is today. Ninevah was destroyed in 605 B.C.E., which is long before the book of Jonah was written, but the author chose Nineveh for this story because the Assyrians were still remembered by the Hebrews as the Enemy, with a capital E. When Hollywood wants to depict villains that will in no way elicit our sympathy, they make the villains either Nazis, or Nazi-like, like the Imperial officers in the “Star Wars” movies. The Assyrians were ancient Israel’s Nazis.

God tells Jonah to take a message to Nineveh. Jonah heads in the opposite direction, jumping on a ship to Tarshish. We’re not sure where that is, maybe Spain; the point is it’s about as far away from Nineveh as Jonah can get. God causes a huge storm, and Jonah tells the crew to throw him overboard to stop the storm. He’s swallowed by the great fish, and after three days and nights of praying, he’s vomited onto the shore.

That’s what most of us remember about the Jonah story, and we probably thought the moral of the story was, “Don’t mess with God!” But that’s not the lesson. The story continues with God giving Jonah a second chance, and Jonah obeys, but his heart isn’t in it. He goes part way into Nineveh and cries out a doomsday message, just five words in Hebrew. The city will be demolished in forty days. You can almost picture Jonah saying to God, “Okay, I did it. Now get off my back.”

And lo and behold, the people of Nineveh repent. They change their evil ways. They turn into upstanding, God-fearing people. So God calls off the demolition. The city is saved.

The first piece of good news in the book of Jonah is that God is the God of second chances. And third, and fourth and fifth chances, and on and on. I recommend the Veggie Tales movie about Jonah, and in particular, the rousing gospel choir that serenades Jonah inside the whale. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YeOnADmkD74). God gave Jonah another chance, and God gave Nineveh another chance. Nineveh; that tells us there is no sin so terrible that God cannot forgive, no hurt so terrible that God cannot heal. This is who God is; this is what God does. It is God’s ability to do the incomprehensible, to extend mercy to the least deserving, that opens the door to our own hope. Everyone messes up, and God accomplished more through Jonah after Jonah messed up than before he messed up. That can be true for every one of us.

You’d think this would be a reason to celebrate, but in the verses that follow, Jonah is furious. The second piece of good news in Jonah – but the news Jonah himself just can’t swallow as good – is that God’s mercy is not the exclusive property of anyone. Jonah was all in favor of God’s mercy when it was flowing in his direction. He just didn’t want any of it to flow over to Nineveh. Jonah would rather die, he says, than live in a world where his enemies can worm their way out of total annihilation by something as flimsy as complete and unadulterated repentance. He sulks in a little hut he builds in the harsh desert wind and sun. God makes a bush grow over Jonah’s head, and Jonah is relieved. But then God withers the bush, and Jonah is exposed and angry once again. And God says, “Is it right for you to be angry about the bush?” Jonah says it is. God says, “You’re concerned about a bush; shouldn’t I be concerned about a city full of people, including innocent children?”

Don’t you get it now, Jonah?

The startling, troubling message in the book of Jonah is that God loves the Assyrians, the most un-chosen people this ancient Jewish writer could conjure up, and Jonah needs to get over it. Although maybe what really would make it as startling to us and as troubling for us as it’s supposed to be is if we substitute a more current enemy. God loves the Nazis. God loves the people on Death Row. God loves Islamic jihadists. God loves the members of the Proud Boys and Q-Anon. God loves Vladimir Putin. God loves whatever politician or news host it is that you love to hate. God doesn’t just love us. God loves them, too.

So the question is, will the joke on Jonah be a joke on us?

© Joanne Whitt 2024 all rights reserved.

Luke 1:26-38

It’s only during Advent and Christmas that most Protestants pay much attention to Mary. Besides the virgin birth, there are a couple thousand years’ worth of theology, piety, and politics layered over Mary. It’s nearly impossible to dig her out from under it all. Some Christians pray to her. Others ignore her on principle. John Knox, the reformer who started the first truly “presbyterian” church, condemned making her an object of worship. Some Christians call her “Theotokos,” the Mother of God. For others, she represents a troubling model of pious femininity — ever sinless, ever virgin, ever mother.

I think the most extraordinary thing about Mary is how ordinary she was.

In this special season, this special holiday celebrating this Special Baby born to this Special Woman, it’s easy to start thinking Christmas is all about extraordinariness. But, on the contrary, if it’s about anything, it’s about the power of the ordinary to bring about God’s purposes. Mary was not chosen to be the mother of Jesus because she was special. She was chosen because she was the epitome of ordinary. A young girl of marriageable age, living an ordinary life in an ordinary town in an ordinary country. What a spit in the eye that was to the folks in power in Rome and Jerusalem.

Mary says, “Yes,” of course, “Let it be; here am I, a servant of the Lord,” but before that, she says something we often skip over. When the angel announces what’s coming, Mary says, “How will this happen?” We know these words; we’ve said these words. Maybe prefaced by “Whoa,” or “uh-oh.” We know that feeling: “How can this work out? What’s going to happen now?” It’s a confession of vulnerability. Mary has got to be thinking, “There is no way I can pull this off. Me? Who am I? It’s impossible.”

And Mary speaks up about that – she shows up with her authenticity as well as her disbelief and asks her very reasonable question; asks it right to the face of that angel from God, for crying out loud, and that’s the first good lesson we get from Mary. She shows us the ordinary courage of speaking up. Over time, the word “courage” became synonymous with heroics, but the root of the word is the Latin word for heart. Courage originally meant “To speak one’s mind by telling one’s heart.” That means putting your vulnerability on the line and in our world, that can be pretty extraordinary.

The angel Gabriel doesn’t try to talk her out of her questions; he doesn’t tell her she can do anything she wants if she just tries hard enough or wants it enough or believes enough. He says, “Nothing is impossible with God.”

Mary listens, and then answers, “Let it be.” Mary’s “Let it be” isn’t the same as “Whatever;” it isn’t acquiescence. That’s a popular assumption and it has served the purposes of those who would prefer the ideal Mary, and by extension, ideal women in general, to be compliant and above all, keep their mouths shut. For starters, this view can’t be reconciled with the other nine stories in which Mary appears in the New Testament. Mary shows up again and again as a woman with gumption, and we see it for the first time right here in this story. She says, “Yes.” Maybe saying yes is the most extraordinary thing about Mary. One writer poses the provocative but fascinating question: “What if Mary wasn’t God’s first choice? Imagine… a whole string of Marys who said, ‘No way.’” And far from being, “Whatever,” I believe Mary’s “Let it be” is much more powerful, much closer to the words of one of my favorite “Star Trek” characters, Captain Jean-Luc Picard: “Make it so.”

Ordinary people doing God’s work. A few years ago, I had my congregation join in this litany that made Mary’s gumption real and personal:
One: Greetings favored ones. The Lord is with you and intends to do great things through you.
Many: How can this be? We are ordinary, everyday people.
One: Yet you have found favor through God, and the Holy Spirit will come upon you, guide you, and work through you to care for this world and people God loves so much. For nothing is impossible with God.
Many: Here am I, a servant of the Lord. Let it be with me according to your word.

© Joanne Whitt 2023 all rights reserved.

Luke 1:46b-55

The lectionary for the Third Sunday of Advent offers Luke 1:46b-55 as an alternative to the Second Reading or Epistle. These verses are a song known as the Magnificat, named for the first word of the song in Latin. The angel Gabriel has just told Mary that she will bear a child. Gabriel then explains that Mary’s cousin, Elizabeth, is also expecting. Elizabeth is getting on in years, so this, too, is extraordinary news. “In haste,” Luke says, Mary goes to see her. When Elizabeth greets Mary, her unborn child recognizes Mary’s unborn child, and turns a joyful somersault. Elizabeth exclaims that Mary and her unborn child are blessed, and in response to this, Mary begins to sing.

And what a song it is! William Willimon tells the story of a college student telling him that the virgin birth is just too incredible to believe. Willimon responded, “You think that’s incredible, come back next week. Then, we will tell you that ‘God has cast down the mighty from their thrones, and has lifted up the lowly.’ We’ll talk about the hungry having enough to eat and the rich being sent away empty. The virgin birth? If you think you have trouble with the Christian faith now, just wait. The virgin birth is just a little miracle; the really incredible stuff is coming next week.”

I have to wonder: If they really thought about it, would more American Christians, or Christians generally, have a harder time with the story of the virgin birth, or with this song of Mary’s? Several biblical commentaries use the word “revolutionary” to describe the Magnificat. Mary’s song blesses God for the victory won over the proud, powerful, and rich for the sake of the lowly and the hungry. This is not a sweet soprano solo. One commentator says it’s more like Janis Joplin at Woodstock; to bring it up to date, maybe we’d say more like Janelle Monáe. But it’s all about God: God’s action, God’s faithfulness, God’s keeping God’s promises – it’s all about what God wants. God moves, and the people at the top who have organized reality for their benefit but at the cost of others come under siege. God keeps the covenant, and a teenager, a nobody from nowhere, testifies to wealth redistribution for the sake of the hungry. The fact that it’s Mary that’s singing this means God does exalt the lowly; that this happened to her means that the overturning of the inhumane order has begun. She is lowly, and she is lifted up.

Now, this is a good news, bad news proposition, isn’t it? Revolution sounds pretty scary to most of us. Cornelius Plantinga writes, “When our own kingdom has had a good year we aren’t necessarily looking for God’s kingdom.”

In December 2023, it’s hard to think of anyone who has had a truly great year. Many of us have much, but we also long for much. We lament the world around us: wars, climate change, growing economic inequality, threats to democracy, intractable political divisions; so much this year kindled our fear and diminished our hope. We also lament the emptiness or pain within us: illness, broken relationships, loved ones in trouble, loneliness. We’re all waiting for God’s shalom. So the question is: Can we hear Mary’s song as good news for all people, not just for some, but for all? Can we truly listen to it, and hear that lifting up the lowly and bringing down the powerful is good news for absolutely everyone? Mary sings about the God who saves not just souls, but real people with real bodies. We’re so used to thinking of “saving” or salvation kicking in only after we die that it might be more helpful for us to use a word other than “save.” Both “rescue” and “liberate” are good translations of the Greek here. We know this because every time the Old Testament writers use the word “save,” as in “God, save us,” that’s what they mean. Rescue us. Liberate us.

God wants to save all of us. God wants to rescue and liberate all of us from whatever enslaves or oppresses us, from whatever deprives us of shalom. And God wants us to act in ways that help that to happen.

© Joanne Whitt 2023 all rights reserved.

Mark 1:1-8

Mark comes out of the gate with news – get ready for something new. Get ready for change. The very first verse of Mark is, “The beginning of the good news of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.” He introduces us to John the Baptist, who shows up every Advent out on the fringes of society in the wilderness, looking and sounding like the last of the Old Testament prophets. His words echo Chapter 40 of Isaiah, but rather than comfort, he says God is on the way and so you’d better shape up. Repent. Quit doing what you’ve been doing and do what you know God is calling you to do.

John’s warning doesn’t sound so much like good news, but this is a specific kind of good news. The Greek word for “good news,” euangelion, the word we translate as “gospel,” was the word used to describe the report brought by a runner to a Greek city that a distant battle has been won, preserving their freedom; or perhaps that a son has been born to the king, assuring a generation of political stability. “Gospel” is good news having seriously to do with people’s welfare, not merely an event that makes some of us happy, but one that shapes our common lives for the better. “Gospel” in this sense means, “It is a new day; everything has now changed, and everything is better.” One writer says that the word “gospel” has become so ordinary that we need to rescue it, and the way to do that is to say that the root meaning of the term euangelion would today best be translated as “revolution.”

But this is not a revolution like other revolutions. God is our model, and especially God in Jesus. God’s revolution is a revolution of compassion and hope. It is a revolution that starts with coming home to God; with changing the human heart. That’s what repentance means: to turn around; quit going the direction you’ve been going. Quit moving away from God and God’s shalom; turn around and come home, just like the old song: “Softly and tenderly, Jesus is calling … Come home.”

A few years ago, a church member gave me a real gift by introducing me to the work of Grace Lee Boggs, a Chinese American philosopher, writer, and activist in Detroit who died at age 100 in 2015. I don’t know what her faith background was, and it doesn’t matter to me and I’m convinced it doesn’t matter to God, either. Boggs was in Detroit during the riots of 1967, and she said initially she was persuaded by Black Power and Malcolm X. But when the destruction and violence broke out, she realized that Martin Luther King, Jr. was right about nonviolence as a way of life, as a philosophy. She said, “In the 1950s, Einstein said the splitting of the atom has changed everything but the human mind, and thus we drift towards catastrophe. And he also said that imagination is more important than education. In other words, the time has come for us to reimagine everything. … We have to re-imagine revolution and get beyond protest – we have to re-imagine revolution and think not only about the change in our institutions but the changes in ourselves.” We need, she said, “to grow our souls, to say that proudly, and unashamedly to talk about the kind of tremendous human transformation we have to make. We must be courageous enough to think that way, and to talk that way and to relate that way.”

“Tremendous human transformation.” If you don’t like the scary, churchy word, “repentance,” try “tremendous human transformation.” John the Baptist would approve. Or even, “to grow our souls.” I think he’d be okay with that, too.

The good news is not only at the very heart of who God is, but also is what God calls us to be. It’s not just John who is called to cry out and prepare the way. It’s all of us. Right here, right now, by making a difference in the lives of the people God has put all around us. Comforting, loving, and participating in God’s revolution of compassion and hope. God is continuing the story of the good news of Jesus in and through our words and actions and each of us will have a hundred and one opportunities this very week to contribute to that sacred story, to make it come alive, to help God keep God’s promises here and now. Advent is about waiting for the fulfillment of all God’s promises, but we don’t wait passively; we’re invited to throw ourselves into that venture both trusting God’s promises and living them right here, right now. After all, as Mark says in his first words, Jesus’ story is just the beginning. The story continues to unfold both around us and through us.

© Joanne Whitt 2023 all rights reserved.

This past Sunday, November 26, as I waited in a quiet sanctuary for worship to begin, a friend and his wife joined me in my pew. My friend is also a retired clergyperson, and he leaned over and asked, “Is it the First Sunday of Advent?” “No,” I answered quickly and with confidence, “it’s Christ the King Sunday. Advent begins next week.” He showed me the bulletin in his hands, the same bulletin I’d been handed on my way into the sanctuary but hadn’t looked at closely. There on the cover in bold letters was, “The First Sunday of Advent.” This congregation had chosen to begin Advent a week earlier than the traditional liturgical calendar. We both laughed, because we both had the same reaction: Initially, mild horror at this departure from tradition, followed quickly by the realization that it was unlikely anyone else in the sanctuary noticed or cared, and humble self-recognition at our knee-jerk attachment to tradition; in particular, to a human-designed liturgical calendar.

A few minutes later, another retired clergy colleague came and sat across the aisle from us. When he came over to greet us, I asked, “Is it the First Sunday of Advent?” Without missing a beat, he said, “No, it’s Christ the King Sunday. Advent begins next Sunday.” We showed him the bulletin, and watched his face go through exactly the same emotions we had experienced. He said, “You know, it really makes sense,” and the three of us shared another good laugh at ourselves.

The liturgical calendar orders the church year into seasons and festivals that follow the life of Christ. One purpose of this calendar is that as followers of Jesus, we might shape our lives according to his life. Another is that the annual cycle gives worshipers meaning, structure, anticipation, and routine in the same way birthdays, holidays, vacations, and anniversaries shape our lives outside the church. The seasons include Advent, Christmas, Epiphany, Lent, Holy Week, Easter, Pentecost, and “Ordinary Time,” which covers the parts of the year not included in one of the other seasons. I love these liturgical seasons. I love that each season has a color for use in worship, for paraments (those cloths that cover a pulpit, lectern, or communion table), clergy stoles, and other worship materials: Purple or blue for Advent (you get to choose!); white for Christmas, Epiphany, and Easter; purple for Lent, red for Pentecost, and green for Ordinary Time. I love that each season is associated with Christian themes: Advent with hope, Christmas with joy and Incarnation, Epiphany with revelation, Lent with transformation and penitence, Easter with resurrection and new life, and Pentecost with the work of the Holy Spirit.

Just as Jesus explained that the Sabbath was created for humankind and not the other way around, I love that we can adjust the liturgical calendar to fit a congregation’s needs. One reason this Advent adjustment makes sense this year is that what would traditionally be the Fourth Sunday of Advent falls on Christmas Eve. By beginning Advent a week before the traditional date, this congregation will observe the Fourth Sunday of Advent on December 17, and Christmas Eve gets to be just Christmas Eve. I served as the pastor of churches that did not make this adjustment those years that Advent 4 and Christmas Eve fell on the same day. On Sunday morning, December 24, few people want to hear about something other than Jesus’ birth, even if they still plan to come to a candlelight service that night. I humbly confess that it hadn’t occurred to me to make this adjustment. Hence, my laughter of self-recognition. Someone said, “It is not by accident that humor and humility come from the same root word. If you can laugh at yourself, you’ll always have plenty of good material.”

Which is why I’m posting this blog. We can love our church traditions, and still recognize that they aren’t carved in stone. They’re just traditions. They’re designed to enhance our worship and guide our growth in faith and practice, but they need to meet the needs of the church. Like many (if not most) other aspects of church life, rigid attachment to “the way we’ve always done it” doesn’t serve us well. And deserves our humble laughter.

© Joanne Whitt 2023 all rights reserved.

Mark 13:24-37

Christians don’t corner the market on hope, but hope is nevertheless a hallmark of the Christian faith. The God of Exodus is revealed as the one who hears the cries of God’s people and responds with deliverance. Jesus points to the God who brings good news to the poor, proclaims release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, and sets free those who are oppressed. Christian hope says things do not have to remain as they are; God desires shalom, which encompasses not only peace but justice, healing, and well-being, for everyone, for all of creation.

Advent is the season of hope. Traditionally, Advent isn’t preparation for Christmas, but for the Second Coming of Christ. The early church assumed Christ would return at any moment, and as the centuries passed, the Church still waited for Christ’s return in glory. Many Christians still await a literal Parousia, while many others, including myself, observe Advent as a time of recognizing that Christ is always coming into our lives. What this looks like is focusing on God’s hopes for our hurting world even in the midst of the chaos and violence, the cynicism and greed, the hatred and tribalism that plague our world. God wants shalom for God’s world, and love is the way.

Advent always begins with an apocalyptic passage. When it looks as though the world is going to hell in a hand basket, that’s when apocalyptic literature shows up. Apocalyptic literature says, “Things are so bad they can’t be fixed. What we need is some sort of spectacular rescue.” This Sunday’s passage in Mark’s gospel is often called “the little apocalypse.” Jesus has just predicted that the Temple in Jerusalem will be destroyed. The disciples ask about signs, and Jesus describes utter devastation. But then, he says, after all this takes place, after everything is shaken to its core and when you can’t even count on the stars to stay in the skies, you will see the Son of Man coming in power and glory. These words were written after the destruction of the Temple. Mark’s audience would hear them and remember the horrific crushing of the First Jewish Revolt against Rome, ending in the siege of Jerusalem. The world as people knew it shattered. No wonder they hoped God would intervene.

It isn’t hard to imagine feeling like that. Maybe you feel as though things are going to hell in a hand basket. Apocalyptic literature is a wake-up call that says, “Look what’s going on! Can’t you see how far we are from God’s vision for us?” Jesus’ advice is, “stay alert,” “keep awake.” That might sound a little threatening. Like you’re watching out for the Boogey Man, maybe? Sometimes it seems as though the whole point of Advent is to keep people from having too much fun getting ready for Christmas. That is not the point. Waking up to how far we are from God’s vision for us reminds us what God wants for us. Waking up reminds us we’re called to hold onto hope for God’s ultimate plans for God’s world.

During my internship many years ago, a church member gave me a little book entitled, Dachau Sermons. The author, Martin Niemöller, was a Lutheran pastor and theologian imprisoned at the concentration camp at Dachau. He’s the source of the famous quotation, “First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out, because I was not a Socialist. Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out, because I was not a Trade Unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out, because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me – and there was no one left to speak for me.”

In the preface, Niemöller explains that for the first seven and a half years of his imprisonment, “special prisoners” like himself weren’t allowed to meet each other or to hold worship services. Then, beginning on Christmas Eve 1944, for no apparent reason, they were granted permission to come together every four weeks for worship until they departed Dachau; a total of six times. The “congregation” included a Dutch cabinet minister, two Norwegian shippers, a British major from the Indian army, a Yugoslavian diplomat, a couple of priests and a Macedonian journalist. They were Calvinists, Lutherans, Anglicans, Roman Catholics and a Greek Orthodox. In our era of growing interfaith understanding, this might seem routine. In 1944, it was practically unheard of.

What could feel darker, more hopeless, more like the end of the world, more apocalyptic than spending over seven years at Dachau? And yet, in each sermon, Niemöller preaches hope. Not optimism, not glib or false assurances that everything will turn out just fine. He says they all know from bitter experience that hope and reality are at times widely separated and often never come together. What he preaches is that God comes anyway. Then, and now, God comes. God comes to us where we are, as we are. Not as the people we are trying to be or have promised to be or so very badly want to be, but the people we are. The families we are. The congregations we are. The communities we are. The nation and world that we are.

Jesus’ Advent call to wake up and keep alert is not a threat. It’s an invitation. He invites us to wake up, to notice, to listen for the ways that God is coming. To notice God’s overwhelming, unimaginable love, and to trust God’s desire to rescue us from ourselves, from injustice, oppression, hunger, sickness, and all the ways we hurt each other. That’s the essence of apocalypse: that God is on the way. God comes. Advent says, “Wake up to that. Notice that. Place your hope in that.”

To those afraid that nothing is ever going to change, that nothing will get better, Advent hope says, “Hold on! God is on the move, headed toward you.” We don’t know when or how and that’s why Jesus invites us to stay alert, eager, actively on the job. As the Christmas carol, “O Little Town of Bethlehem,” reminds us:
How silently, how silently,
the wondrous gift is given!
So God imparts to human hearts
the blessings of His heaven.
No ear may hear His coming,
but in this world of sin,
Where meek souls will receive Him, still
The dear Christ enters in.

© Joanne Whitt 2023 all rights reserved.