Advent 2 B: Active Waiting
Dear Partner in Preaching,
There’s waiting…and then there’s waiting. Do you know what I mean? Some waiting is, well, just waiting, the pointless exercise we all have to endure from time to time. Like sitting in the doctor’s office, just waiting for your name to be called so you can get your flu shot. But other waiting seems to matter. Like waiting in the doctor’s office for the results of the biopsy to come back or waiting to see the ultrasound of your coming baby.
I suspect you know what I mean. Some waiting feels empty and pointless, while other waiting is weighty, significant, and really matters.
Too often, I think, the kind of waiting we talk about in Advent seems like the former. Waiting to sing Christmas carols. Waiting to decorate the church narthex or chancel. Waiting for Christmas generally, as if we’ll spoil it if we don’t wait just right.
But I don’t think that’s the kind of waiting Advent seeks to invite at all. To get at that, it helps to realize that Advent is all about promises. And not just Advent, of course, but the whole Gospel. Given that most scholars consider the terse, descriptive opening verse of Mark – “The beginning of the good news of Jesus, the Son of God” – not to be, actually, the first line of the book but rather its title, Mark literally begins his account with a promise of Isaiah. It’s the promise of Isaiah to desperate Israel at one of the low points of its history. And while Mark clearly invites us to see John the Baptist as the fulfillment of Isaiah’s promise that one will come crying out in the wilderness, it’s the whole of Isaiah’s promise of comfort, deliverance, and renewal that Mark is claiming happens in the ministry of the one John heralds.
And the thing about promises is that they are not static. Not ever. Rather, promises – if you hear and believe them – create an expectation about the future and set something in motion. When I promise my kids we’ll play a board game after the chores are done on the weekend, inevitably the pieces are set out. When you promise to call someone after a date, that person typically anticipates the call. And when a friend promises you a ride home after the game, you don’t make other arrangements – why should you; you’ve got a promise.
Do you see what I mean? Promises create an expectation about the future and that future expectation sets something in motion right here and right now in the present.
The same is true about God’s promise. Truth be told, even more so. And that, perhaps, is the key message of Advent. That in the stable at Bethlehem God is not only keeping promises God made to Israel but also making promises to us. That in Jesus, God hears our cries of fear and concern and doubt at our lowest points and responds.
And, my goodness, but the headlines seem full of low points. Whether about the spread of Ebola, unrest in the Middle East, delayed – or perhaps deferred – justice in Ferguson. And to these cries for deliverance, God responds with promises of healing, peace, and justice in and through the life, ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus.
I know, I know, we’ve heard that kind of promise before, and at times it may feel like just oh, so much more pie in the sky. But consider this: What if God’s promises are not all eschatological, something we wait patiently for until the end of time? Or, maybe more accurately, what if we are invited to participate here and now in the eschatological promises of God by contributing to them in the present? What if, that is, part of how God keeps God’s promises is through our efforts to heal, comfort, help, and bring justice?
Mark has something to say about that as well. You know how I said the first verse is probably Mark’s title for his work and so the opening verse (second verse in our Bibles – a little confusing, I realize!) is a promise. Well, the title is a promise, too. Notice that Mark doesn’t call his book, “The Good News (Gospel) of Jesus.” Rather, he titles it “The Beginning of the Good News….” Which means that everything Mark has to say about Jesus – all the healing, preaching, teaching, exorcising, and even Jesus’ death and resurrection – is only the beginning of the good news. There’s still more to come.
Maybe that’s why Mark’s Gospel ends in such a strange, unsettling way. (You remember, the angel declares Jesus resurrection and commands the women at the empty tomb to go share the good news but they run away terrified and say nothing to anyone.) Mark concludes his Gospel with an open-ending because it is, after all, just the beginning. The story isn’t over. Which means we are all invited to continue the story of the good news of Jesus as God continues to write the Gospel of Jesus in and through our lives as individuals and communities.
So perhaps, Dear Partner, the question to put to our people this week is what kind of waiting do they want to do? Sure, they can sit around and wait for Christmas, or Christ’s return, for that matter. Or they can get in the game, see how they can spend their time, energy, wealth, and lives making a difference right now. Because it’s not just John who is called to cry out and prepare the way. It’s all of us. Right here, right now, waiting actively, if you will, by making a difference in the lives of the people God has put all around us. 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.
No, what we do will not bring ultimate healing or comfort or peace or justice. That’s God’s job, and God will keep God’s promises to the fullest in the fullness of time. But we don’t have to wait for that passively but are invited to throw ourselves into that venture both trusting God’s promises and living them right here, right now.
This is the kind of active, involved, participatory waiting Advent invites. And why not get started now. After all, and as Mark says in the first words of the passage we read, this story about all those wonderful things that happened long ago? It’s just the beginning, and the story continues to unfold both around us and through us.
Thanks be to God, Dear Partner, for promises that impact and shape our present by creating a vision of the future and inviting us into it. And thanks be to God for all those who will cry out those promises to those eager to hear. Blessings on your proclamation this week and always.
Yours in Christ,
David
Post image: “The Preaching of St. John the Baptist” by Bacchiacca, 1520
Hurray1 What a wonderful perspective on Mark’s gospel. I have read it, preached and heard it for 70 + years but this is the first time I have really noticed what is happening in these two verses. Thank you.
Thanks, David, for yet another really rich set of ideas. As I prepare to get busy on Sunday’s homily, I am thinking of the events in Ferguson, and those who are asking, as they have for centuries, “How long must we wait?” How long, until justice comes? How long, until the promises hinted at in Mark become reality? It has always stumped me how, on college and university campuses where I have spent most of my adult life, students who identify themselves as Christian will flock to upbeat worship services where the theology espoused is about how each of us get salvation, too bad about the others. Those of us who offer meaningful and upbeat worship experiences as well, but who want to deal with the justice mandate of the Gospel, have trouble getting a hearing. Perhaps we cannot pierce through the numbness that Jeremiah and the prophets were up against, and that plagues us as well. Who will dare to believe that there is a promise that is being fulfilled? How can be break through the spiritual attention deficit that many of us face with our constituencies? I don’t know the answer, but I keep coming back to one hope, year after year: if Isaiah cannot get our attention and cause us to be filled with anticipation, no one can! I cannot help but be hopeful.
Thank you very much, David for the wonderful work, the great insights you are offering week after week.This is an other wonderful perspective you are offering here and It will certainly contribute to my sermon preparation this week.
I have used your ideas very often, but never took the time to say thanks. Know that you are very much appreciated. You are a blessing! Thank you very much.
Shalom,
Lucretia van Ommeren – Tabbert
David, I’m with Lucretia, your insight and generosity have been a boon to me many times as I wrestle with the scripture week to week in my sermon preparation.
Peace Be With You.
Thanks again for instigating thoughtfulness in new directions! We have two Sundays to reflect on John the Baptist, but the phrase “preaching a baptism for the remission of sins” or however it’s translated makes me wonder: what if the baptism we receive, the cleansing transformation and redirection of our vision of who we are and whose we are, leads not only to the forgiveness of our sin, but leads to our ability to forgive others. The messenger going before points to the exodus from Egypt. Isaiah prompts us to comfort God’s people, not be comfortable as we perceive ourselves to be God’s people. Do we dare demand fire from heaven, as Elijah did, upon the offerings we ourselves make to the many false gods we blithely worship? Mark’s gospel has an immediacy to it. So do our own times.
A low point indeed. Lack of access to health care, wealth ineqality, poverty, hunger, homelessness all add to up a very low point. And I would submit that justice in Ferguson is neither delayed nor deferred but ignored completely.
Thanks as always for your insight. In a sense you are here recapturing something of the original intent of Advent-which has been largely hijacked by our society as a pre-Christmas season.
Advent was around before Christmas became a major feast (strictly speaking, it remains liturgically a lesser feast), but was associated with Epiphany and the deeper revelation of Jesus–leading through Epiphany to Septugesima and the beginning of Lent and the journey to Easter. Advent wreaths are not representative of the prophecies of the birth of Jesus, but are symbolic of Christ’s passion, death, and victory. The cross and crown, not the creche, are the symbol of Advent.
While Advent focuses, to some degree, on the promise of the second coming, it also points to the one who is in our midst. It reminds us the Lord is near–not just in His expected return, but his presence with us now. Advent is about a double coming (Pius Parsch)–his coming in flesh among us, and his coming in glory–both of which are realized in the Eucharist (Parsch, in THE CHRUCH’S YEAR OF GRACE, Liturgical Press, 1962). The kingdom is thus, not far distant, it is within us. We live into this reality as we are strengthened in word and sacrament–knowing that God will be true to his promises and make all things new. We are privileged in that he calls us to share in this through our witness in word and deed–as we pray for the return of the Christus Victor: “Come, Lord Jesus.” If we can reclaim this original sense of Advent, perhaps we can speak more powerfully to society’s issues wherever God’s people long for justice and peace. Thanks David for giving us a glimpse of this deeper meaning.
A broken hearted thanks for these words. This Sunday we say goodbye to human rights activists who lost their refugee hearing in our country because of the professional misconduct of their lawyer (who until this family blew the whistle had been taking money from refugees, not doing any work, and sending them back to torture and silence). It is a heartbreaking Sunday for our church. We need the words “comfort my people.” We need to cry out in our wilderness. We need to know this is the beginning of something, not the ending. Thank you for your ministry to us in this time of painful waiting.
Its so funny in reading your work I really discovered that I don’t hold a lot of hope for promises. I guess I don’t have many expectations for real, for God, for things in my life. Per haps its my mainline denominational sort of practical upbringing. I don’t think I really dare to have expectations, or perhaps I’m aware of my privilege as a white female. The promises are biblical, not personal; having to do with my life. Salvation is too abstract. I like how you bring it more home to our active participation. Perhaps I have to dream more.
Could you use black type instead of the light grey type. It is so much harder to read. Thanks for your consideration. Signed, Getting Older Peg
Thanks for your note, Peg.
I wish I could change the type but don’t know how. I apologize for the inconvenience; I’d find black easier as well!
David
I love this commentary. I especially like the idea you crafted of the on-going promise and our participation in it.
Years ago I preached a sermon that keyed off that first line of this gospel, the title line. To me, it was very much like the opening of Dicken’s classic “A Christmas Carol,” in which he writes ““Marley was dead: to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that…You will therefore permit me to repeat, emphatically, that Marley was as dead as a door-nail.” To understand the Dickens tale, you had to fully believe that Marley was dead. To understand the gospel, you must truly understand that Jesus is the Son of God – died and risen. This declarative statement at the beginning of the good news seems to be something that will make all of the rest more clear.
Thanks once more for your insightful commentary – my go to first sermon prep.
Thanks David. I really enjoyed your thoughts on this passage. It brings a lot of insight and hope. Blessings.