And then on Saturday morning, I sat down at my desk and opened my bible to Matthew's Gospel. In today's reading, there seems to be no "holiday cheer." Jesus calls out the horrors of the Noah story, the tale of God sweeping away an alienated humanity like a hose suddenly blasts away an ant hill. Jesus warns us of God sneaking into our lives like the bad guy in a scary movie, jumping out from behind the couch when we least expect it. As I read on, my ears began to buzz with those crazy evangelical cries about the Rapture: half of humanity left in judgment while others are swept up to heaven. The sharp contrast from Friday night to Saturday morning gave me inner whiplash. While the world is promoting cheer, here we Christians are, seemingly wallowing in darkness. While the world waves neon swords, we light one scrawny candle. While the world jumps into the bustle of "the holidays," we insist on waiting and watching in the dark. While the world manufactures smiles, we cling to a God who offers hope in paradox. What are we doing?!
Perhaps a story and an image will help articulate the meaning within this counter-cultural Advent season. When I was first ordained, I spent eight months serving as a longtime supply priest in a small town more than two hours away from my home in Louisville, Kentucky. Every Sunday morning, I'd get in my car at 6:30 in the morning and head west along the Ohio River. I'd spend time with this congregation, and then I'd head back home in the afternoon. It was a long day, but over the summer, it was a quiet, easy drive, and I usually didn't mind it too much. By November, I was starting out in darkness, though. As soon as I left the city lights behind, the sky would be wrapped in thick black cloth that hugged my car like a blanket. With all my concentration, I had to keep my eyes carefully fixed on the small segment of road right in front of me. I could only see the narrow path illumined by my car's headlights. It was a limited path that ended in the darkness of the unknown road ahead.
In lives filled with unknowns, we often wish that God's light could be like those headlights. We think that the Light of the World is a focused beam that we can point into the future and swivel across the landscape to ease our fears. Engrossed in the path ahead, we think that we are in control, that we can use even God's light to herald our own causes and chase away uncertainty. In today's Gospel, Jesus is trying to make us understand. Deep down, we know that Jesus speaks the truth when he insists on our own powerlessness over the night, on our lack of understanding of the ways of God. He's simply trying to remind us to watch and wait for the arrival of God's true light, rather than anxiously peering into the little stretch that we can grasp for ourselves.
Indeed, on those trips to Western Kentucky, as I strained to control the road ahead, God's true light was silently sneaking up behind. As I headed West, the dawn began in the East, coming in like a thief in the night. On nice days, a routine glance in my rear-view mirror showed slivers of pink and coral light slowly, silently peeking through the hills and trees. Soon, daylight would wrap all around me. I would smile at the subtle beauty of a new day and turn off the car's headlights, relieved. "Ah yes, this!" I would sigh. "Thank you, God, for this new day. I get it." On nice fall days, it was easy to appreciate God's ways.
But I still didn't understand. The weather didn't always cooperate on Sundays, you see, especially in the winter. Sometimes, it would rain, or even snow or sleet. When things got rough, God's ways were no longer enough for me. Instead, I would obsess over the weather channel all day and night on Saturdays. I would try in vain to predict the next day's forecast, as if knowing could change the weather. Getting in the car, I would be more anxious than ever, more focused on controlling the car, following the beams, scanning the road ahead, so as not to slip. One Sunday, it seemed so, so dark. When I got to the place where I usually noticed the dawn, everything was still dark. Even in the rear-view mirror. Frozen fog had obscured everything. I couldn't see any delicate hints of the light to come. But I had to keep moving. I forged onward, tense as a strung bow, blind to everything but the road ahead. Unnoticed by me, though, the blackness of the night finally gave way imperceptibly to gray: a gray that grew brighter and brighter until I suddenly realized that I could see, and that my car's precious headlights had become superfluous once again.
That's the way it is in Advent. There's no blinding divine light that we must accommodate ourselves to. There's no flash of Glory. Neither is there the need for blinking neon swords or raucously blinding cheer. The arrival of God is an imperceptible dawning: yesterday, a lowly birth; someday, a return of the dawn; today, a quiet glimmer of love, a streak of hope, and a twinkle of joy in the smallest everyday gestures. Jesus is asking us today to acknowledge that, while our eyes are set on controlling the darkness, God is ushering in the light of day.
You might be surprised, but I'm not advocating that we boycott or scorn the holiday cheer. I'm no longer a card-carrying member of the dreaded priestly "Advent Police." But I am advocating that we also set aside enough time in Advent to wait and watch, as Jesus asks us. We need Advent as a season to look at the world as it is, bare and uncovered by glitz and daily busyness. Hope, after all, is born out of reality, not dreams. Let God's light slowly reveal the world around us: the houses and the trees; the people we love and those we hate and those to whom we are indifferent; the poverty and the richness of life; the beauties and the horrors of our world. And as we await the Light, reality awaits our loving attention.
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