Signs of the Season

So here we are at the dawn of a new year in the church calendar. That sounds strange, doesn’t it? Here we are at the end of November and I’m saying ‘Happy New Year’ to you. Even after my whole life in church it still catches me up short, too, but today is the day when the whole church year starts moving in a new direction.

Advent is the name for this season. It comes from a Latin word and the ‘vent’ part is related to the verb for ‘coming.’ The ‘ad’ part refers to all the advertisements you’re going to see between now and Christmas urging you to spend money you don’t have on things no one needs. Actually, that’s not true. I mean it is true that you’re going to see those ads, but it’s not what the word means. An advent is an important arrival and it does come from Latin roots that mean ‘coming to.’

What is the important arrival we’re waiting for during this season? In a sense we’re looking in two directions in Advent. The church year really walks through the life of Jesus. It begins as we look towards the promise of a coming Messiah – a savior for God’s people – and it moves to the story of Jesus’ first advent – first arrival among us in the manger of Bethlehem. But we are also looking ahead to the second advent of Christ.

We are also moving into a new gospel for the coming year. This last year has been the year of Mark and today we start to hear a lot more from Luke, who will be our primary companion in the gospel readings from now until next Advent. Luke is the one who gives us most of our images of Christmas. This is the gospel that talks about the shepherds in the fields and the angel appearing to Mary and ‘no room in the inn’ – all of those important Christmas images are in Luke and nowhere else.

That’s not the section we read from today, however. Today we read from a section of Luke that talks about Jesus’ second advent, his second coming. Jesus is talking to those gathered around him in the Temple in Jerusalem and he is telling them to pay attention for the signs of his return. The signs will be fearful for the nations. They will look at the sun and the moon, the star and the seas, and they will be afraid -- dropping dead from fear and foreboding, even. The return of Jesus on the clouds will be a source of confusion for the world, but for Jesus’ followers it is something to look forward to. “Be strong. Take heart. Keep your heads high,” Jesus says. “Your day of liberation is drawing near.”

He goes on to tell them to pay attention to the signs that can see in the fig tree. They know that when the blossoms appear on the fig tree it is a sign that summer is coming. In the same way they should be alert because the signs should tell them that the reign of God is ‘drawing near.’

That phrase keeps repeating. ‘Drawing near.’ Your day of liberation is drawing near. Summer is drawing near. The reign of God is drawing near. Jesus wants us to pay attention because something is drawing near and he does not want us to miss it.

Are you in danger of missing it? Do you get anxious like me at this time of the year – afraid that maybe there will be so much activity – so much frenetic busy-ness – so much distraction that you will miss it? I don’t even know what ‘it’ is, but every year I have this sneaking suspicion that all the stuff I fill December up with is keeping me from paying attention to something God is trying to tell me.

It feels a little like those tests they did where they took a bunch of people and showed them a series of playing cards. They would flip them over one at a time and the test participants would just have to stop them if they saw something wrong. The researchers replaced two of the regular cards with cards that were wrong – something like a red club or a black heart. The test participants could not pick out what was wrong.

They were so programmed to see a deck of playing cards a certain way that they couldn’t pick out errors, but they did get more anxious as the test went on. On some level below the surface they knew something was wrong and they just couldn’t figure out what the problem was. That’s how I feel about this season. Something is going on and I don’t want to miss it.

When Suzanne and I were living in England during the year I served a church there in the early 90s, I picked up on a British habit that seemed very curious to me at the time, but which I appreciate more and more. It had to do with gifts. When our British friends would receive a gift, it would receive a lot of attention. No matter how small, no matter how seemingly insignificant, the recipient and whoever else was around would begin to evaluate it.

It could have been a tea kettle and they would start to say things like, “Ooooh, it is dear, isn’t it? That color is very bright and it will look quite attractive in the kitchen beside the cozy. And look at the spout, it’s at a very good angle for pouring. Look how its lid fits just so in the opening. I quite like that handle, too.” They would turn it over and admire it from every angle. And for the rest of the day they would talk about it with whomever they met. “Don’t you know, Alex and Suzanne gave me this tea kettle and it’s dear, isn’t it? Look at the spout, it’s a very good angle, isn’t it? It just wants putting out with biscuits for an afternoon cupper.”

My first reaction to all this was to think, “My goodness. Come on. It’s just a tea kettle. Don’t make such a fuss.” But then I started to think about how we often receive gifts in our culture. We are so used to the qualities of mass production that we are not very attuned to the uniqueness of the things we get. We are grateful to receive a gift, but very often we don’t consider the gift. We don’t see the wonder in it. We just put it to use or add it to our collection.

Over time I began to see that what my British friends were doing was expressing wonder and love in their response to the gift. I mean, they are British, after all, and not well-known for expressing affection. But in spending so much time on something as simple as a tea kettle they were saying, “This gift is important. It is touching to me that you would give me this item and I want to appreciate it in the best possible light. I’m going to stop and marvel in this item because I am marveling in this moment and I am thankful for you.” At least, that’s what I choose to believe they were doing.

Recently I have been reading for my prayer time a prayer book that uses the work of the English poet Gerard Manley Hopkins as its focus. Hopkins lived in the 1800s and became a Jesuit priest in the Catholic Church. He had a rather frustrating career as a parish priest and then as a professor in Dublin, Ireland and he never had a poem published during his lifetime. Even when he died at the age of 44 his best friend, named Robert Bridges, who collected his poems, refused to publish them for fear that they would not be received well. It wasn’t until 30 years after his death that they were published and now he is recognized as one of the best poets in the English language.

What I am discovering is that Hopkins had this English ability to appreciate a thing in its uniqueness. In his journals he would look at something as simple as a bluebell and describe it so vividly that it was impossible not to see that flower as a sign of God’s glory. Just listen to how he describes this:

I do not think I have ever seen anything more beautiful than the bluebell I have been looking at. I know the beauty of our Lord by it. Its inscape is strength and grace, like an ash tree. The head is strongly drawn over and arched down like a cutwater. The lines of the bells strike and overlie this, rayed but not symmetrically, some like parallel. They look steely against the paper, the shades lying between the bells and behind the cockled petal-ends and nursing up the precision of their distinctness, the petal-ends themselves being delicately lit. Then there is the straightness of the trumpets in the bells softened by the slight entasis and by the square splay of the mouth.[i]

Isn’t that amazing? I mean, I have no idea what all that means, but the attention that Hopkins is giving to a flower – seeing in it the beauty of God. I tried it the other day. I was out by the garden space in the watershed here at the end of the church building and I decided to try and describe the scraggly magnolia tree. It is not a picture of perfection like the bluebell Hopkins had, but by the time I had spent ten minutes writing about this tree I was convinced that it contained the universe. And I know now that should that tree fall before I do, I will mourn its loss. Because I paid attention, I see something new. Even that magnolia is filled with the glory of God.

I can only hope that God sees in each one of us a little bit of that wonder. Hopkins uses the word ‘inscape’ to describe that inner structure of all living things that is a bit of the divine within. If we can see the inscape of each living thing, each person, we will perhaps be seeing as God sees and not missing ‘it.’

So this is my annual Advent charge: Be alert. Keep watch. “Be careful that your hearts do not become weighed down in stupor and drunkenness and care for the matters of this life and that day catch you not expecting it like a trap.”

This season is too important to let it pass by in a blur. Don’t just do something; stand there. Stop and be. Watch and pray. Your soul, like the Virgin Mary’s, is giving glory to God. Don’t miss it. Thanks be to God.

Luke 21:25-36

"Now there will be signs in the sun and moon and stars and upon the earth an imprisoned dismay among the nations who will be in anxious watch at the roar of the sea and waves. People will be dropping dead from fear and foreboding of what is coming upon the civilized world, for the powers of the heavens will be rocked. At that time they will see the son of humanity coming in a cloud with power and great glory. Now when these things begin to take place, be strong and keep your heads high, because your liberation is drawing near."

Then he told them a parable, "Look at the fig tree and all the trees; when you see them put forth blossoms, you know that summer is already drawing near. In the same way, when you see these things taking place, you will know that the reign of God is drawing near. I tell you the truth, this generation will not pass away until all things have taken place. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words shall not.

"Be careful that your hearts do not become weighed down in stupor and drunkenness and care for the matters of this life and that day catch you not expecting it like a trap. For it will come in upon all the residents upon the face of the whole earth. So be awake at all times, praying that you will be able to escape all these things that are about to take place and to stand before the son of humanity."

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[i] Gerard Manley Hopkins, quote in 40 Day Journey with Gerard Manley Hopkins, ed. by Francis X. McAloon, [Augsburg: Minneapolis, 2009], p. 30.