Advent 4 C: Singing as an Act of Resistance
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Advent 4 C: Singing as an Act of Resistance

Posted by on Dec 14, 2015 in Dear Partner | 19 comments

Dear Partner in Preaching,

Would you consider, on this Fourth Sunday in Advent, omitting the sermon in favor of a hymn sing?

I know that’s a lot to ask, and I’ll explain why in a moment. But first I should say that even if you don’t want to omit the sermon – and, trust me, I get that, even admire it! – at least consider keeping the sermon shorter than usual in order to give more room to the hymns of the season.

So…why my advice to privilege singing over preaching this week? Well, let me suggest Luke as my example. Have you ever noticed, that is, how often Luke employs songs in the first several chapters of his story about Jesus. Mary sings when she is greeted by her cousin Elizabeth (today’s reading). Zechariah sings when his son John is born and his tongue is finally loosened. The angels sing of peace and goodwill when they share their “good news of great joy” with the shepherds. And Simeon sings his song of farewell once he has seen God’s promises to Israel kept in the Christ child. (We might even say that Jesus sings his first sermon, given how many of the themes articulated earlier come through in his briefest of sermons in Luke 4, but that’s another story…or sermon.)

Why, one might wonder, all these songs? Because singing is an act of resistance. That’s not to say that all singing is, of course. Sometimes it’s an act of joy and sometimes of camaraderie, but it’s also an act of resistance.

The slaves knew this. When they sang their spirituals they were both praising God and protesting the masters who locked them out of worship but couldn’t keep them out of the promise of deliverance of the Bible. And the civil rights leaders knew this, too, singing songs like “We Shall Overcome,” when so many in the society didn’t give them a chance to advance their cause of justice, let alone triumph.

The protesters in Leipzig in 1989 new this as well. While that element sometimes gets overlooked in the histories of the “velvet revolution,” it’s striking to note that for several months preceding the fall of the Berlin wall, the citizens of Leipzig gathered on Monday evenings by candlelight around St. Nikolai church – the church where Bach composed so many of his cantatas – to sing, and over two months their numbers grew from a little more than a thousand people to more than three hundred thousand, over half the citizens of the city, singing songs of hope and protest and justice, until their song shook the powers of their nation and changed the world. (Later, when someone asked one of the officers of the Stasi, the East German secret police, why they did not crush this protest like they had so many others, the officer replied, “We had no contingency plan for song.”!)

I think Mary and Elizabeth knew this as well. I think, that is, that they knew just how ridiculous their situation was – two women, one too old to bear a child, one so young she was not yet married, yet called to bear children of promise through whom God would change the world. And they probably knew how little account the world would pay them, tucked away in the hill country of Judea, far from the courts of power and influence. And they probably knew how hard life was under Roman oppression. Yet when faced with the long odds of their situation, they did not retreat, or apologize, or despair, they sang. They sang of their confidence in the Lord’s promise to upend the powers that be, reverse the fortunes of an unjust world, and lift up all those who had been oppressed. When you’re back is to the wall, you see, and all looks grim, one of the most unexpected and powerful things you can do is sing.

I was reminded of the power of song three years ago at this time of year, when a few days after the killings at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, we happened to sing O Come, O Come Emmanuel in church on Sunday morning and one of the verses gave such powerful and poignant voice to both the despair and hope so many of us felt:
O Come, Thou Day-Spring, 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.

As tears flowed and voices were lifted in this song that Sunday three years ago, I realized that singing of light in a world of darkness is, indeed, nothing short of an act of resistance.

My former colleague Gracia Grindal, one of the church’s most prolific contemporary hymn writers, started one of her Advent hymns with a line that captures this sentiment well: “We light the Advent candles against the winter light,” she penned. Not “because of,” or “during,” but “against,” reminding us that the light of Advent, like the light of Christ, is a veritable protest to and resistance of the darkness that gathers all around us.

Given how much the darkness seems to have grown in recent weeks, perhaps we might yield some of our preaching time to singing the hymns of both of Advent and Christmas. The hymns of both seasons manage to combine the realism of our world with the promise of Christ, and in this sense provide such a needed counterpoint to the dread headlines to which we’re subjected via news outlets, on the one hand, and the falsely cheery “Christmas songs” blared across the cultural airwaves this month on the other.

Caught between the false dichotomy of despair and optimism, Mary and Elizabeth remind us that of another way, the way of hope. Hope, you see, implies circumstances that are dark or difficult enough to require us to look beyond ourselves for rescue and relief so that we might hear again and anew God’s promise to hold onto us through all that might come and bring us victorious to the other side.

So perhaps a shorter than usual sermon this Sunday in order to make room for some of the great hymns of the season would be just the thing to remind our folks of the hope that draws us to church. Perhaps we might even make room for a carol sing of sorts, inviting folks not only to name a favorite carol, but to share why it inspires them to hope when the world seems dark.

Well, however you may celebrate this Fourth Sunday in Advent, Dear Partner, know that I give thanks for your voice raised in song and proclamation, announcing that Jesus Christ is the light of the world, that light that shines on in the darkness, the light the darkness has neither understood nor overcome. It is a song worth singing yet again, and I’m grateful for your part in sharing it.

Yours in Christ,
David

PS: In addition to “O Come,” and Gracia’s wonderful hymn (you can find the lyrics here), I’d also suggest Rory Cooney’s fabulous hymn based on the Magnificat, “The World is About to Turn.”