...the mystery of coming to us

Rejoice! Rejoice!

Emmanuel shall come to thee,

O Israel!

---Latin hymn

Breathless from the bustle of autumn, we arrive at the first Sunday of Advent. Here in a football town, it seems we rush straight through football season headlong into the string of holidays that stretch from Thanksgiving through New Year’s. If we observe it, the season of Advent can give us a chance to take a breath, focus on the meaning of Christ’s birth, prepare our hearts for a sea change.

Abby and Sarah have always felt that this hymn, from the 12^th century, is the only appropriate way to usher in the season. I think that its words delineate, in mysterious yet earthy fashion,  the difference between Christianity and religion. First there is the name given for this coming Savior --- Emmanuel, “God with us”. Not God up there, or God on a throne, or God with a big naughty or nice list and a long memory. God…with…us. Then there is the rest of the short refrain: “Emmanuel shall come to thee”. Jesus is the God who comes to us. No more beseeching the heavens, stumbling around in the dark, crying out and hearing only the echo of our prayers.

God with us, come to us. Mystery, bound to earth. Rejoice!

...straw against the chill

There within a stable, the baby drew a breath
There began a life that put an end to death.
And in the frozen stillness, a mighty voice is heard:
"God is here among you! Human is the Word!"
It was so long ago, but we remember still:
Star upon the snow, straw against the chill.
A planet dancing slow, a tree upon a hill,
Star upon the snow, straw against the chill.
---Bob Franke

Emmanuel. God with us. Here. Now. All the straw we'll ever need against all the chill we'll ever encounter.

...all I want

O come, Desire of nations, 
bind all peoples in one heart and mind;
bid envy, strife, and quarrels cease;
fill all the world with heaven's peace.
Rejoice!
Emmanuel shall come to thee, O Israel!
---Latin hymn, c. 1710

Desire. As I word-process these words, Mariah Carey's voice is singing to me out of my iPad Pandora channel: "Make my wish come true...all I want for Christmas is you." The scuttlebutt on Facebook is that DietPepsi drinkers really, really, really want their aspartame back. In 1946, Don Gardner just wanted teeth---at least, that's what his holiday hit, "All I Want for Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth" said! All Steve Martin wanted in The Jerk was "this ashtray, the remote control, the paddle game, this magazine, and the chair." And if you watch the ads around holiday time, folks really want vacuums (watch as the vacuum commercials magically disappear into a 10-month black hole on Dec. 26!). Surely this can't mean no one vacuums except between Thanksgiving and Christmas (I mean, no one but me)?

Imagine, though, what God's desire for God's own creation might be, what God's intent for this humanity (created in God's own image) might be. Imagine one people. Imagine working together to solve humanity's issues with the good of the littlest, the lost, and the least in mind. Imagine setting envy aside; moving beyond grasping at resources like shoppers in the flat screen aisle at a Black Friday sale; giving up our right to hold grudges.

Imagine that world. And then put on your work gloves---there are walls to tear down, and bridges to build. Because God is not a stand-around-and-watch-it-happen kind of God. God is a grab-a-hammer-there-are-plenty-of-nails kind of God. And I want in on building that world.

O come, Desire of nations, 
bind all peoples in one heart and mind.

...do you believe something?

O come to us; abide with us,
our Lord Emmanuel.
---Phillips Brooks, 1868

"I don't believe in anything. Do you believe something, Ms. Armstrong?" The teenage question was casual, almost throw-away; but there was already a life's worth of pain and betrayal in the carefully-controlled voice, the meaning of life bound up in the few words. I knew my answer had to be truth. And it had to be clear. Oh, and it had to be right then. Because life happens, well, at the speed of life. And I knew she'd already heard plenty of sermons. And lectures. And object lessons.

And she did not believe. Not one thing. 

And while I gathered up the pieces of my heart from where they'd fallen as it shattered, once again, at a broken world that does this to its kids, I slowed my breathing, and gathered my racing thoughts, and stilled my heart, and breathed a prayer. Wisdom, I prayed. Courage, I pleaded. Hope, I begged. Love, love, love, past pain, past failure, past bleak unbelief. And in I plunged.

"I do believe. Not in a God who micromanages the world and every little thing that goes on in it. I have seen too much hurt and pain in this world to believe that way about God. I can't be down with God pulling all the strings behind a world like this. But I do believe. I believe so much in a God that walks this life beside us, hurting with us when we hurt, and celebrating with us when we celebrate. This is the life with God I have experienced, and I can tell you I believe it."

"Well, I know you're right about the world, Ms. Armstrong."

God help us, I'm right about the world. God willing, I'm right about walking together. Here in this holy season, we anticipate the arrival of a God whose name is Emmanuel, 'God with us'. Not some God-up-there, or God-that-was, or God-with-a-carrot-and-a-stick. But God-here laughing at an inside joke,  God-here weeping at the pain of a hurting world, God-here when the path is the most difficult to discern. God-here God-now. Close as breath. Abiding. Emmanuel.

I believe.

...what's in a name?

"This child shall be Emmanuel, not God upon the throne,
but God with us, Emmanuel, as close as blood and bone."
The tiny form in Joseph's palms confirmed what he had heard,
and from his heart rose hymns and psalms for heaven's human word.
---Thomas Troeger, 1985

Throughout the history of God's called-out people, divine love has been claimed, and spoken, and worked in intervening acts. God has made love known for a precious nation in a thousand large and small ways, noticed and unnoticed. God has broken into history in mighty and powerful ways, rescuing and restoring God's people time and time again.

And time and time again the love of God fades into the distant memory of the beloved people.

So God takes on a new name, and this name changes everything. Because as much as I love words, they only go so far. Because the most logical prose, the most moving poetry, the best-ever 140-character zingers have their limits. Because being there, in the flesh, means more.

Emmanuel, God's new name, is 'God with us'. Because when love words don't break through, sometimes you show up in person.

Thank God.

...help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi

O come, thou Dayspring, come and cheer
our spirits by thine advent here;
disperse the gloomy clouds of night,
and death's dark shadows put to flight.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel 
shall come to thee, O Israel.
--- Latin prose, pre-9th cent.

It's always darkest before the dawn. Don't know if that's true, because I'm no kind of scientist. Lots of folks say it, which makes it crowd-sourced truth (the kind that matters these days). And really, when I think about it, I believe it must actually always be darkest furthest from the dawn. Right? Like, middle-of-the-night dark? Can't-see-your-hand-in-front-of-your-face dark? Scudding-clouds-blotting-out-the-stars dark? That kind of dark doesn't even have a shake-hands relationship with dawn. It's always darkest in the dead 3 a.m. middle of the night, dusk just a memory and dawn a lifetime away. This is the kind of dark where a little bit of light could transform the world.

To be honest, the news has felt kind of like this 3 a.m. dark lately. I say to myself, "Self, surely this is 3 a.m.; it can't get darker." Then, I turn on the news again, I open the paper, a tweet pings my iThing. And I blink my eyes to dilate my pupils, straining to see through the inky dark. The inky darker. No dawn in sight. Hope grows as thin as the blanket I pull more tightly around my shoulders, losing the battle against the darkest part of the night. Honestly, could our human family have done any more complete a job of plunging this God-gifted world into complete night than we have? Here in the middle of the night, with plenty of fault to go around, light-starved, desperate --- where can we turn?

Dayspring, Light of Light, Emmanuel ---
help us. You are our only Hope.

Emmanuel comes a-singing

To us, to all, in sorrow and fear, Emmanuel comes a-singing;
his humble song is quiet and near, yet fills the earth with its ringing;
music to heal the broken soul and hymns of lovingkindness.
The thunder of his anthems rolls to shatter all hatred and violence.
---Marty Haugen

I have a Tibetan singing bowl. To play it, I slowly and steadily circle a heavy wooden dowel around the rim of the bowl. At first, I would promise that nothing is happening. But I keep the dowel circling, slowly, steadily. And gradually I feel a vibration in the fingertips on which I balance the bowl. And then there is a low hum, the kind I wonder if I am imagining. But it is there, and it is steady and solid in some way. And the longer I circle the dowel, the fuller the sound grows, and I can hear it and feel it filling me.
I imagine Emmanuel coming, singing, this same way. We may not hear a song at first; may just notice a change in the quality of the air in the space. Then, the slightest hint of harmonic vibration; and as you stand very still, you realize the song the Savior sings resonates through every cell in your body, and rings in every corner of your soul. Overwhelmed with the music, you become the song the Savior sings.


...so here we stand, whoever we are,
bathed in the light of a star...

Where Is God?

How could this happen? How could we let this happen? Didn't his mother know he was ill, know that a home with mental illness inside is not a place for guns? Were security procedures followed? Was he seeing a therapist or counselor who should have known he was a danger? How will shattered families be made whole? Will the world ever feel safe again? Where is peace?

In all of these questions, we really just ask this one: Where is God? Where is God when innocents are slaughtered, when madness goes unnoticed until it is too late, when the world turns upside down? Where in God's name is God?

Immortal Babe, who this dear day
Didst change thine heaven for our clay,
And didst with flesh thy godhead veil,
Eternal Son of God, all hail!

The answer, whether in verse (this one from the Bishop of Exeter in the 1600's), or in a word (Emmanuel) is...God with us. When we suffer, when we mourn, when we give in to despair --- somehow, someway, God with us. There may be unanswered questions, and asking them may rend our hearts. But the answer to THE question, the one that vanishes our loneliness and fears, is just this: God is with us, in the middle of our mess, our sorrow, our anguish.

Emmanuel --- God with us.

God with us!

Rejoice! Rejoice!

Emmanuel shall come to thee,

O Israel!

Breathless from the bustle of autumn, we arrive at the first Sunday of Advent. Here in a football town, it seems we rush straight through football season ( no matter what kind of season it is) headlong into the string of holidays that stretch from Thanksgiving through New Year’s. If we observe it, the season of Advent can give us a chance to take a breath, focus on the meaning of Christ’s birth, prepare our hearts for a sea change.

Abby and Sarah have always felt that this hymn, from the 12^th century, is the only appropriate way to usher in the season. I think that its words delineate the difference between Christianity and religion. First there is the name given for this coming Savior --- Emmanuel, “God with us”. Not “God up there”, or “God on a throne”, or “God with a big naughty or nice list and a long memory”. God…with…us. Then there is the rest of the short refrain: “Emmanuel shall come to thee”. Jesus is the God who comes to us. No more beseeching the heavens, stumbling around in the dark, crying out and hearing only the echo of our prayers.

God with us, come to us. Rejoice!