November 28, 2021 + First Sunday of Advent + Luke 21:25-36 + Seminarian Liz Kuster
Something is stirring—can you feel it? It’s been affecting me lately. In fact, a few weeks ago, it affected me to the point that after Sunday morning worship, I got in my car parked on Addison and drove. I drove out of the city. Something in my body just said, go. And I went. And as I was driving out of the city, towards a nature preserve I knew and acres of trees I could practically smell–pine and decaying leaves, I hardly noticed the traffic. Or the duration of the drive. I was so intent on what I envisioned ahead. It beckoned me with vibrant colors and brilliant shafts of light. When I arrived at the edge of the woods, I could see the forest was changing, passing away for the season. As I hiked, I saw an ecosystem at work: fungi perched on rotting logs and poking up through the thick layer of dead leaves that covered the ground. It was another world unto itself. I walked through. My mouth open. My head gazing upward, watching the tall tree limbs grow bare, all submitting to the wind and sending more of their foliage dancing to the ground.
What led me there was something I can’t quite describe—an internal, spiritual shift perhaps—a sign of some sorts, but it stirred me, and it was loud and clear and tumultuous as the roar of the crashing waves. Perhaps you too, have felt these internal signs. These cosmological pulls in a direction that you ordinarily wouldn’t be going. Signs that you are on the precipice of something. Something big. A change. Something that shakes the very foundations of your world.
Here, on the first weekend of Advent—the first weekend of the new church year—the earth beneath our feet is shaking. Something is stirring and We all are standing together on the precipice of something new. And to be honest--it’s a little scary. Our gospel today does not speak directly to the warm and fuzzy feelings we may get when we tune our car radios to our favorite Christmas channel. It doesn’t even refer directly to the Christ child born of our beloved Mary. Isn’t that what we are preparing for in this season of advent? A babe in a manger? Instead, we are met with visions of end times. Apocalyptic prophecy. Predictions of chaos and warnings to be ready for it.
This scripture? I have some friends who would be here for it, and perhaps right now you’re running a list of your favorite apocalyptic books and film through your head. The list in my head is relatively short because quite honestly this idea that fascinates millions terrifies me a little bit; For me, and perhaps for you too, I find there is enough apocalyptic reality to our lives that I lack interest in seeking it further in film or literature or art.
What I mean by apocalyptic realities, are those moments in life when it feels like our worlds that we have so carefully constructed, fall all around us. We take care of our bodies, and yet we get sick. We are good people, and yet, we are betrayed. We work hard, and yet, our endeavors can fail. Relationships fracture. Loved ones die. We get phone calls we don’t expect and news that we cannot prepare for. We hear how racism has killed another beloved child of God. We hear how violence has been brought down on our LGTBQIA+ communities. We are still living through a global pandemic. In some parts of the world, any signs from the sun would be hidden by the smog of air pollution. And the stars and the moon are veiled by light pollution. There are plenty of apocalyptic realities all around us. And in these awful, devastating moments what we know is gone. Our old reality passes away and we cannot go back.
But, I wonder–are we supposed to go back? Because In our scripture today, Jesus gives us a lot of instructions on how to prepare for what feels like the unpreparable. In none of these instructions are we told, “don’t worry,” that “it will all go back to normal soon.” Absolutely not. Instead, he says, “Heaven and earth will pass away…but my words will not pass away.”
“My words will not pass away.” Let that sink in a moment.
I hear this part of the passage and I am immediately taken back to a 12-year-old Liz, standing at the top of a rock wall under the clear night sky at a summer camp back in Iowa. My body was still shaking from the climb up to the top and uncertainty at this new elevation. One of the staff members hooked my trembling body up to the zipline (which was the only way down) and waited for me to jump. I remember questioning as to why I would consciously make the decision to step off the solid platform beneath my feet. I almost couldn’t. What allowed me to move forward, was staring up into the brilliant array of bright stars and trusting that the rope would carry me.
“My words will not pass away” This is our zipline folks. This is when we jump off the ledge of the world we know and are carried off, being held by this enduring factor. The word made flesh that lives within us and sustains us through our most apocalyptic moments and stirs within us holy anticipation of what is to come: The kindom of heaven
And it’s so near! And it isn’t near because we are four Sundays away from Christmas in which we celebrate the birth of the Christ child. No, we cannot limit God to our lovely liturgical calendar. The kindom of God is near every time we share the good news and the grace of God in our words and actions and deeds. This new world is near every time justice and love prevails in communities. It lives in our bones and comes alive through our care for creation, those on margins, and those in deep suffering.
And so my hope is that we are not waiting passively. My hope is that we embody these moments of God on earth by allowing this holy anticipation to stir us to action throughout our lives. For us. For creation. Bringing justice and belonging. For it is all so near–Can you feel it?
Amen.