A Sermon from Advent Sunday 2021. I found myself drawn back to Bonhoeffer on Advent - words from his prison cell. The readings were: Jeremiah 33:14-16, 1 Thessalonians 3:9-end and Luke 21:25-36
For 21 days, a man went on hunger strike for his imprisoned wife.
This week, 27 people died after their boat sank in the Channel.
In Greece, 28 Afghan female MPs fight on from a parliament in exile.
Storm Arwen has brought 100 mile an hour winds and torrential rain.
Rising sea levels in the Gambia have left 30 hectares of land too salty to grow rice.
On the earth there is distress: confusion, fear and foreboding.
Do event the powers of heaven shake?
The church year begins here: in the dark hours before dawn and, in the northern hemisphere at least, in the season of shorter days.
We begin here: not with fireworks and parties of a new year; nor even with the familiar image of a babe wrapped in swaddling clothes.
We begin with distress, fear, confusion and foreboding: we begin with the world as it is now. We notice and name the fragility and the determination; the forces beyond our control; the fears and the hopes.
Now, it might seem that things fall apart; and yet, there will be justice, safety, righteousness and abounding love. Hearts will be strengthened and not weighted down.
The twentieth-century theologian, pastor and martyr Dietrich Bonhoeffer was imprisoned because of his criticism of and active opposition to the Nazi regime. In 1943, he wrote to his fiancee, Maria, of the dark hours of their lives. He wrote: ‘we shall ponder the incomprehensibility of our lot and be assailed by the question of why, over and above the darkness already enshrouding humanity, we should be subjected to the bitter anguish of a separation whose purpose we fail to understand’.
From that place of separation and isolation, he found words of hope - reflecting on how we can and should prepare for and celebrate Christmas despite the ruins around us. For there, as he says to Maria, we find that ‘God is in the manger, wealth in poverty, light in darkness, succour in abandonment’.
It is in the season of Advent, that Bonhoeffer holds on to love - to goodness and light - even in the midst of signs of distress. He wrote this to Eberhard, one of his closest friends: ‘Life in a prison cell may well be compared to Advent. One waits, hopes, and does this, that, or the other--things that are really of no consequence--the door is shut, and can only be opened from the outside.’
In Advent, our senses are in a way sharpened as we wait for Christ's coming in the here and now. yet, as prophet Jeremiah hints, we cannot bring about the completion of God’s promises on our own terms - as an act of willpower or in accordance with our own agenda and timing.
Jeremiah calls us back to trust in the Lord’s promise: both in the midst of the desolation of his own age, when restoration seemed a long way off, but also in the face of the distress, fear and foreboding of our world.
Christ has come and will come to execute justice, the righteous branch who will bring us health and salvation. As Bonhoeffer wrote: Christ ‘is coming to rescue us from the prisons of our existence, from anxiety, from guilt, and from loneliness’.
Today’s readings sound an alarm - they call us to attention - so that we can both see the world and our lives as they are, but also knowing that Christ has set us free. It is the words of Jesus’ prophetic wake up call that our hearts are strengthened not weighed down; that our hearts are turned outwards rather than turned inwards. This freedom writes Bonhoeffer sets us free from ‘thinking only of ourselves… it means to be for the other: the person for others. Only God’s truth can enable me to see the other as they really are’.
In the distress of the nations, the raging storms and people fainting from fear, even when the heavens are shaken, Jesus calls us to be present here and now: to embrace reality and know the nearness of God with us. It isn’t always easy.
When our hearts being weighed down with worry; when we numb our reactions with alcohol, consumption or escapist fantasies, we are sucked into a cycle of despair - the loss of hope. As human beings, we will always find something to fill the gap: to find meaning, purpose and worth outside of ourselves; to find a flicker of satisfaction or happiness.
Advent offers a different path. It is one picked up in the letter to Thessalonians. They were a Christian community aware of the distress of the earth, who were encouraged to live in hope not fear.
It’s a letter which echoes Jesus’ invitation to be alert and attentive; we are to look and see.
We are invited to fix our eyes on the coming dawn, even when it is dark; to look out for new leaves, even in winter. Only when we are alert will we see the coming of God’s kingdom and play our part in it as we respond to the needs of others.
Then will our hearts be strengthened. The Thessalonians were learning to rise to the challenge of this way of life too. For them hope flowed from relationship with God and others. They brought joy to others; they were a source of gratitude. They were held in prayer - and Paul and others longer to be with them face to face.
Thankfulness, delight in the other and the pulse of prayer turn our hearts to hope. Prayer for protection and strength, for wisdom and imagination, for courage and guidance; and above all love.
Love that increases and abounds: love for God, for the one standing at our door; love for ourselves, in our frailty and dignity; love for others, in their different gifts and needs.
This Advent, may we embrace that longing: a longing as we lift up our hearts in prayer and worship, that our hearts might also be strengthened and opened to others.
In this season, we begin in darkness and strain our eyes towards the light. We long for the manger, for our arms to cradle the life and love of God in a speechless babe. For now we wait - we wait with longing and hope, with obedience and expectation.
Bonhoeffer went on to say that not only was Advent ‘a season of waiting, but our whole life is an advent season, that is, a season of waiting for the last Advent, for the time when there will be a new heaven and a new earth.’
Such waiting is an active way of life: not only full of longing but also a time to notice what is going on. Look says Jesus - where are there sprouting leaves, where is dawn breaking?
This blend of longing and noticing shapes our imaginations - as our hearts open towards new possibilities. Who might need company and support because they can no longer leave their house unaided? Who might need mentoring and encouragement so that they might flourish in school?
The God we believe in comes in unexpected ways: eternity was enclosed in the life-giving darkness of a young woman’s womb so that we might know the light of God’s very self in flesh of our flesh.
When the earth is in distress, may we be people of hope; when we are gripped by fear, may our hearts be strengthened. With gratitude and joy, may we look towards the light and life which is born amongst us to save us.
We must do all this more intensely as storms rage and heavens shake: we wait in hope because the God who was in the manger will be with us still. As Bonhoeffer gives us space to respond to God’s love with and for us, saying: 'as long as there are people, Christ will walk the earth as your neighbour, as the one through whom God calls you, speaks to you, makes demands on you. That is the great seriousness and great blessedness of the Advent message. Christ is standing at the door; he lives in the form of a human being among us. Do you want to close the door or open it?’
© Julie Gittoes 2021
