"Is
That All There Is?"
When you are a small child, Christmas is a magical
time of the year. In our house, the excitement began to build around
Thanksgiving. Macy's parade, with Santa coming into town, and relatives who
would come for dinner and stay for a week, signaled the beginning of Advent to
me. Soon we would make our annual family pilgrimage downtown, to eat hot
pretzels from a stand down near Market Square, maybe get some oyster stew at
the Oyster House, see the town decked out in its Christmas finery and,
especially, check out the animated windows at Kaufman's, Horne's and Gimbels. Kaufman's was always the best, usually telling a
story that ran half way around the building. Folks would stand five or six
deep, slowly moving around the building as if we were on a slow-moving
escalator.
Then would come the annual
Tour of Relatives. My favorite was when we visited my dad's godfather who,
although he lived in town, I think still had outdoor plumbing. I remember his
house as very small - and I was small myself at the time. The wonderful thing
about him was a display that he set up in the middle of his living room - a
mountain, around which ran a small stream. Every year he would carve a figure -
today you'd call them an "action figure" - and give it its place on
the mountain. I especially remember a skier that came down the hill, a Lorelei
sitting along the banks of the river, and a man paddling a boat down the river
who, when the Lorelei winked, would tip over. The whole thing ran on watch chains
and weights!
Anticipation and expectation are part of the
excitement that belongs to Advent. There is a natural building of the season
toward the summit that is Christmas. Yet, as we grow older, and some of the
magic becomes tarnished, we tend to lose our excitement. And
along with it, the sense of expectancy and anticipation.
The early Christians to whom Peter writes faced the
same problem. After a generation of waiting, they begin to wonder what they are
waiting for. Their world seems to be falling apart around them, life is getting
more confused, and they wonder where they are headed. They look back at the
incarnation, the death and resurrection of Jesus, and
they begin to wonder, "Is that all there is?" Is that the end of it?
Where do we fit in? What is there to wait for? What is our hope? They are
beginning to lose their sense of expectation, of foot-tapping anticipation.
Peter tells them that we are, indeed, waiting for
something more - our waiting is not empty or fruitless or foolish. He says, "We
await a new heaven and a new earth where, according to his promise, the justice
of God will reside."
You see, there are two meanings of the word,
"wait," and the two are tied together. The first refers to anxious
anticipation, the sense of expectancy we connect with Advent, the season of
waiting. The other has to do with attending or serving. A person who attends to
another is called a "waiter" or "server." Jesus used this
term to refer not only to himself, but also to those
who attend to or serve his word, his world, his people. The waiting of Advent,
from this perspective, means to serve, to attend to His promises and to His
people.
This is the image of a mature faith - not the
foot-tapping, can-hardly-wait attitude of childhood, but the faithful servant
who is attentive to God's promises, and attends to God's people. The holder of
a vision, who is active in creating a new reality - the reality described in
our Advent passages: the new heaven and new earth, the place where the lion and
lamb lie down together. The one who waits is one who is creatively and actively
involved in bringing God's plan to fruition. That is the great excitement of
Advent.
One of my favorite movies is an old foreign film
called "Babbette's Feast." It is the story
of a little village, a community of faith once founded
by a pastor with a vision, but since his death, has become a rather joyless
place. The people live out their lives in simple but rigorous piety, but seem
to have lost the heart of their faith - until a young woman, a French girl,
comes to live with them, fleeing persecution. Their faith forces them to take
her in, although they are unsure about this outsider. She lives among them for
years. Then, one day, she receives word that she has won the lottery, and
proposes that, before she leaves, she will fix the village a feast. They cannot
turn down the offer, but wonder as all kinds of odd things begin showing up in
the village - things they would never normally eat. But they have agreed, and
when the day comes, the whole village is at table. They agree that, no matter
what happens, they will quietly eat it and say nothing. One course after
another comes out - amazing things, the sight of which they have never before
seen. Solemnly they set themselves to their task. In the end, it turns out that
she was a world-famous chef, and the food, of course, delicious delicacies the
likes of which is usually only set before kings and queens.
Over the table, as they eat and drink, they share
their history, and long-running battles are forgiven. Love is restored, and
faith renewed. They discover the core of what the old pastor had taught them.
And before they leave, today's Psalm is on their lips: "kindness and truth
shall meet; justice and peace shall kiss."
Is that what we discover today over our common meal?
Do we discover a vision of reality that fills us with longing,
that fills us with hope? Do we find ourselves strengthened to serve the
promise of the new heavens and new earth, to help bring in a realm where the
lion and lamb lie down together?
We serve more than the celebration of a memory -
however appealing that memory may be. We serve the future. We serve the coming
kingdom. We wait, patiently but fruitfully, for the new heavens and the new
earth. It's birth throes are already in progress -
here, among us, in this fellowship - in our hearts, in this gathered family
where the Spirit of God's future is already working.
Let us wait, like children in anxious anticipation,
expectantly. Let us also wait fruitfully, as mature servants of the Lord,
serving the vision of God's future, of the new heaven and new earth. He is
coming soon! Even so, Lord Jesus, come to us! Amen.