“Oh, that you
would tear open the heavens and come down!
Oh, that the
mountains would quake!!!”
How bad would it
have to be to make you beg God to
destroy the fabric of our world,
rip open sky and
earth and space, and arrive with destruction more dramatic and terrifying than
any Hollywood special effects department could
dream up?
How bad would it
have to be, before you and I would pray for that kind of drama and destruction
in Lombard ?
Can you imagine
it?
It’s that bad in
Ferguson .
It’s that bad in
the communities near St. Louis
and around this country that are bleeding and devastated this week, protesting
and praying and sometimes lashing out in pain that was focused this week by
news that a grand jury did not indict
the police officer who shot Michael Brown in August.
It’s that bad in
Chicago , even
if the protests here are quieter. It’s
that bad in parts of Lombard , too, even if you
and I never hear about it here.
Is it that bad
for you?
How do you feel, when you see this news? what do you pray?
How do you feel, when you see this news? what do you pray?
It can feel far
from Lombard ; it can feel like it doesn’t
affect us.
After all, this happens
often enough that it barely ripples the news in most cases: a black or brown
unarmed man or child is shot, and often the shooter is exonerated.
Our world is not
set up to punish police who shoot and kill in the line of duty. Our world is set up to protect those who act
in self-defense.
That’s good.
But our world is also set up – by the same system – to punish
young black and brown men for expressing themselves, to punish the victims of
systemic, impersonal racism
for anything that makes the rest of us uncomfortable, and to kill young men whose opportunities are already limited, whose lives are already bound by other people’s fear.
for anything that makes the rest of us uncomfortable, and to kill young men whose opportunities are already limited, whose lives are already bound by other people’s fear.
That’s what’s
driving protest and heading the news in Ferguson
and around the country. Not just one incident, but that whole system.
The words are
different, but people not too far from us are living that cry of Isaiah’s for God to tear open the heavens and
shake the earth; for God to bring desperately needed change so radical that it
will feel like our world is torn apart.
The people of Israel knew
something about despair and distress when Isaiah pleaded for God to come with
power and fire and destruction. And Jesus speaks to that kind of pain,
acknowledges a suffering community, when he promises the coming of the Son of
Man heralded by the ruin of the heavens, by a darkened sun and falling stars.
Today, on the
first day of Advent, Jesus and the prophets invite us to stand with them in
that place of desperate longing, to feel the unrelenting pain and grief of
prejudice, oppression, fear, and division, so that we, too, can cry out for the
coming of God in unimaginable, scary, power.
In the prophets’
Those things are
disruptive. Those things require the
powerful to lose their power, and most of what’s comfortable about our everyday
life to radically change. All those things cause protest and prophecy in the
streets, and moderate challenges in the courts, in Jesus’ time and in ours. And those godly longings also spilled over
into riots and destruction in Jesus’ time, just like in ours.
In Ferguson , and around this
country, protesters and activists long for a world where black and brown
children are treated with real care and protection and love –
especially when those children are 6’4, and strong,
and even more
vulnerable to other people’s fear.
In Ferguson , and here at
home, people long for a world where oppression and racism aren’t embedded,
hidden, in the systems of law and commerce, so that we are bound by them, even
if we don’t want to be racist. A world where
hearts that long to be fair and loving actually can be free of the fears and divisions of racism.
I long for those things.
I long for God’s
justice in this country – justice that brings more balance and healing than
courts or laws or death ever do.
I long for a
world where no police officer is ever scared of an unarmed 18 year old; where
no one is scared of that teenager, not in the dark or in the daylight, and no
matter the gender of that teenager or the color of their skin.
I long for a
world in which my own heart, my own life, are as affected by Michael Brown’s
life and death as they are by the health of my family and the life of this
congregation.
I long for those
things, and I tremble, because I know that to achieve them would mean a
transformation of my life and of our world as disruptive and dramatic as
falling stars, torn heavens, and quaking bedrock.
I don’t like it,
but it feels
like Advent.
Because Advent,
this season of preparation – and Advent, that final coming of God that we pray
for in every Eucharist – Advent demands that kind of longing.
Advent demands that we long for deep, radical
justice and peace and healing; long for it so strongly that we plead for even
the most disruptive transformation of this world.
Maybe you don’t
long today for the same things God’s people are crying out for from Ferguson , the kinds of
things that Israel
longed for at the time of Jesus,
but we could.
We can pray to God
to expand our love, and break down the barriers – often invisible – that keep
you and me from demanding justice in the streets this week.
And I expect you
do long for something. For healing or
peace or justice or love, small and personal or the size of the whole world.
It’s Advent.
It’s time to
stop being shy about the transformation we long for,
it’s time to
deepen our yearning for God
so that we are ready for anything.
so that we are ready for anything.
So take a
minute, right now, to reach deep into your heart.
What is it that you long for?
I suspect – I
hope – that you do yearn for something
more in this world.
The coming of
God – as an infant, or in glory and power – depends on that.
What love or peace or justice or healing – small or large – would you be praying for if you stopped being practical, if you were willing to risk your comfort and stability?
Write it down.
Offer it to God
as a gift, the first of our Advent gifts this season.
Write it down,
open your heart wide to that yearning as we pray, share peace, bless the bread
and wine, and bring it as a gift to God as you come to communion.
And all week
long, all Advent long, practice yearning. Practice a longing for God that is
more powerful than fear, or comfort, or stability.
Because it could
still be this year that God comes in
power and glory, tearing the heavens, or transforming the earth.
“Stay awake,”
Jesus said, because it could be this
year that our longing transforms the world.
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