Advent Begins in the Dark

Advent begins this Sunday.

We're not walking into it bright and sunny. Instead, we're thinking of Colorado Springs. The families and friends of those killed, injured and traumatized in the latest mass shooting.

We feel grief, anger. We're tired this keeps happening. We fear it may get worse, or simply keep happening. We're so tired of it we're trying not to let it in.

So we're not exactly relishing the gauzy glow of candles. Our holidays traditions are a little dimmer, less cheery.

And yet this is the only way to walk into Advent. Not with a drowsy Hallmark glow. We are like the people Isaiah spoke to -- a people in a land of deep darkness. It's kind of ironic: the more our eyes are open, the more we're in the dark.

Thomas Aquinas talks about two dangers here. One is presumption. The idea that we can see it all clearly. This could take the form of optimism or cynicism. The other danger is despair. We give up. We refuse to see at all. We don't know and it doesn't matter.

But the place between these is hope. Hope can't see it all, but it also doesn't stop looking. Hope is of the same species as faith. Hope relies on trusting God for the future, in the midst of deep darkness.

Advent is this middle place of hope. That's why I borrow Madeline L'Engle's phrase for Advent, the Irrational Season. Presumption and despair make sense, when we add up all the facts. Hope considers the facts too, but says,  because it is dark, maybe I can't add it all up. Maybe I can't make sense of it. Maybe we're called to walk in the irrational for a while.

That middle place, that razor thin path of hope, would be an impossible place to live in were it not for the promise--found in Isaiah, found everywhere else in the Bible--that we will see a great light.

Light comes to us; we don't find it. All around is deep darkness; the light will shine.

Welcome to Advent.

- Pastor Eddy