Perhaps you have heard there is a war on Christmas.
Santa setups crowding out Nativity scenes. Secular
songs replacing traditional carols. The celebration
of this holy day upended by generic greetings in
recognition of a nondescript season. The term has
been with us for nearly twenty years, making it
(according to one commentary) “America’s latest
forever war.” Now I understand the controversy, but
I would suggest that we’ve misidentified the threat.
From my vantage point as a pastor, Christmas seems
to be holding up rather well. I imagine we’ll have quite
a crowd here three weeks from today. Scripture’s story
will take center stage, and we’ll sing the carols we
know by heart.
Advent, on the other hand, is under attack. Ask
most folks when the Christmas season begins, and
you’re likely to hear “as soon as the leftovers are
gone” or “when the calendar turns to December.”
Afterall, Christmas follows Thanksgiving, as every
child’s calendar and grocery store display clearly
communicates. Advent, the season of the church
year that begins today and takes us all the way to
Christmas Eve, is threatened. In fact, there’s a kind
of cold war on Advent. The strategy is subtle. The
tactic: total disregard, refusal to acknowledge the
season’s existence. And for the record, I do not count
Williams Sonoma’s $200 “Luxury Advent Calendar”
as an exception.
It is not hard to understand why we avoid Advent.
It’s the season of waiting. That’s a tough sell. When
we were putting up our Christmas tree and our lights
last weekend, our son Samuel asked me if I’d be
preaching Christmas sermons now. I tried to explain
to our fourth grader a bit about Advent, but he tried
to help me out in return. “Dad, I think people like the
Christmas sermons better.”
He is not wrong. The longing for Christmas joy and
holy light is reasonable. We want Christmas, right this
very minute. Advent stands in our way. Waiting is not
the thing. It’s the thing that comes before the thing. It
must be endured.
But, hear me out for a moment. What if the waiting is
a gift we need? What if the season of Advent is the
only true path to Christmas?
The billboard on the side of the road asks, “Are you
prepared to meet Jesus?” That’s the right question for
the Advent season. These four Sundays give us time.
Time to prepare—not our homes, but our hearts. Think
of it. How many times have you reached Christmas
and found yourself wondering where the time went?
Advent is our invitation to wait on purpose. To wait
with purpose.
This season at Second, we’re going to take a
different path to Christmas. Actually, four different
paths, because the Bible is not a solo act; it is a
chorus of witnesses.
So, this December we’re going to pause in each of the
four Gospels to listen for what Christmas preparation
sounds like there.
And we begin with the earliest and most succinct
Gospel. We start with Mark. And, at first glance, you
might think there isn’t much to say about Christmas
in Mark. (Shortest sermon ever!) No pageant. There
are no shepherds, no wise men, no stable, no star,
no baby lying in a manger. Mark seems completely
unaware that any of that ever happened.
Mark does not decorate his Gospel with tinsel and
bright lights. He has no tree. And perhaps that is the
best reason for us to begin here. Mark is all about
Advent. In Mark’s Gospel, you can feel the weight of
the waiting. Mark may not dwell on the birth of a baby,
but he knows where to find God in human form.
He describes how Jesus was baptized by his cousin
John in the Jordan. He gives us a message of hope in
words spoken by a heavenly voice. “You are my son. I
love you.”
That’s a beautiful moment, but it’s just a moment.
Immediately (that’s Mark’s favorite word), Jesus is
driven into the wilderness. In fact, that’s where we
find Mark’s messenger. And so, it’s where we find
ourselves at the start of this season.
In Mark’s Gospel, the wilderness is both setting and
character. It’s where his story begins. Calling on
the words of the prophet Isaiah, Mark speaks of a
messenger preparing the way for the miraculous.
A voice crying out in the wilderness. What does
the voice say? Prepare the way of the Lord. In the
wilderness, prepare the way.
Mark may not tell us where Jesus was born, but he
knows where Jesus can be found. In the wilderness.
And that’s good news for we who know the
wilderness. You may wish you didn’t, but you do. The
war on Advent may insist that we can skip Mark’s
story altogether and run straight to Christmas angels.
But Mark’s messenger has something to teach us.
Jesus meets us in the wilderness.
So, this December, resist the urge to rush ahead,
to turn up the Christmas songs and drown out the
voices crying out. This year, sit in the discomfort of a
world still waiting. Wait with families who keep vigil
for loved ones held hostage, and those who huddle
in basements as bombs drop overhead. Stand in
the shoes of patients whose medical tests brought
ominous news. Remain with all who dread the coming
of nightfall or fear the dawn of a new day.
When we are in the wilderness, we can acknowledge
the truth that all of us cause and carry pain. That we
are deeply divided by calcified conviction with no
commitment to conversation. That we exist in chaos
created by violence and injustice. That fear grips
us. Mark knows that what we lack is not the syrupy
sentimentalism of a secularized sacred season. What
we need is hope. Hope in signs and symbols, in
wonders and in words.
In the wilderness, we hear the promise that provides a
path. You are my child. I love you.
That’s Christmas in Mark’s Gospel: the assurance
that God’s grace does not, will not, cannot, leave us.
The Advent gift that Mark offers us is the courage to
wait in the wilderness, where Jesus can be found. The
place where hope is most needed is the place where
God is most present.
I don’t know what the wilderness looks like for you
this year. I do not know the specific burdens you bear
or the heaviness you carry into this season. I do know
that you could name them one by one. Whatever it is
that wakes you in the middle of the night. Whatever
won’t let go of your heart. Whatever occupies your
mind. I know that the whole world feels a bit like
a wilderness this year, that we’re all wandering in
search of signs of hope flashing like points of light
against a sea of darkness. I know that we’re searching
for reasons to rejoice—not the empty calories of a
forced or false merriment that withers like grass and
fades like summer flowers, but hope. Sturdy hope.
And Mark tells us that this hope is often found in the
least expected places. That it’s often found right next
to pain. That hope stands side-by-side with sadness
whenever we open our hearts to receive it.
Miss Lena never missed the annual Christmas caroling
in the neighborhoods near Vandalia Presbyterian
Church. In fact, in her eighty years, no one among us
could remember a time when Miss Lena had missed
anything. Not worship or a youth car wash or a
fellowship dinner or a Bible study. But certainly not the
Christmas caroling, for which she always provided her
world-famous pound cake.
But this year had been different. Miss Lena’s
husband of fifty-eight years, Edmund, had died at
the beginning of December, and we were all worried
about her. She seemed suddenly somehow frail and
fragile. And then, the morning of the caroling, the
phone call came. I heard my father on the other end of
the line reassure Miss Lena that we would persevere
without her. She just wasn’t feeling too well. She
would need to skip the caroling this year.
As we left our final stop and prepared to return to the
church, my younger sister, Emily, had an idea. If Miss
Lena could not come sing with us, then we should
go sing to Miss Lena. The adults in the group were
unanimously dead set against it. They did not want to
impose on a grieving woman or be a bother. But nineyear-old Emily was insistent, and she rallied a dozen
determined kids to her side of the argument. Before
we knew it, we piled back in the vans and made our
way to Miss Lena’s house.
When we arrived, the front porch light came on. She
stepped onto the screened porch and welcomed
us with tears in her eyes. Then she sat down on the
couch. I remember it so well. Emily sat next to her.
Miss Lena cried through every note of every song.
That night she wept openly, without one shred of
self-consciousness or shame. And many of us wept
as well.
Listen. Our hope will be found not only in festive
gatherings or choirs of angels singing Gloria. We will
find hope in the wilderness, where the tenderness
of vulnerable love is spoken in hushed tones. The
grieving woman rests her hand on the teenage boy’s
shoulder, singing Silent Night as tears fall. And hope
holds us in the real world, where our lives and God’s
life are woven together, and where peace and love
and joy coexist with sadness and pain and loss.
You may have missed them, but there are angels in
Mark’s Christmas story. They do not blow trumpets
or sing praise to God in the highest heaven. In fact,
they aren’t in heaven at all. You already know where
they are. In the wilderness. With the wild beasts. You
already know what they’re doing. Waiting.
So don’t rush. Just linger. Just trust. Just hope. Just
wait. Just listen for a voice you know by heart and a
promise you need to hear. You are my child. I love you.
I always will. Amen.