Hard Stuff

O God, whose blessed Son came into the world that he might destroy the works of the devil and make us children of God and heirs of eternal life: Grant that, having this hope, we may purify ourselves as he is pure; that, when he comes again with power and great glory, we may be made like him in his eternal and glorious kingdom.

- this Sunday’s collect

Our opening collect this Sunday gives us an indication of what kind of readings are headed our way leading up to Advent. Devil? Purify? Comes again with power? At this time in the church year, the readings take a decidedly apocalyptic turn. And although during Advent we will hear familiar stories about Mary and Joseph, we will also hear about the fiery John the Baptist and his stern call to repentance. And the gospel reading on the very first Sunday of Advent is always related to death and destruction in some way or another. It’s no wonder that department stores don’t decorate for Advent. It would look more like Halloween!

Why is Advent like this? Maybe it’s because the season of Advent is not just about waiting for the arrival of the beautiful little Christ child in the manger, it’s also about awaiting the coming of the Cosmic Christ at the end of time. Granted, a little baby surrounded by lambs is a much more palatable topic. On Christmas Eve there’s no talk of Satan, hell or eternal judgment. Thankfully. However, in awaiting the arrival of that baby, our lectionary will not let us forget that death is as much a part of life as birth is.

I remember awaiting my first child over 30 years ago. I couldn’t help but wonder if the baby would be born healthy, or worry about whether I would survive childbirth. Because of my own experiences of pregnancy, birth, miscarriage and the loss of a child, it really makes sense to me that some of the scariest biblical readings are presented to us as the nativity approaches. I’ve experienced first hand how fear and excitement can be very close to one another in life - maybe you have, too. Our faith tradition will not let us ignore the difficult and sometimes frightening big questions that are twinned with the awesome, beautiful ones.

Last Sunday, before the service in which little Samuel was baptized, I went over the baptism service with the parents and godparents, noting that the ‘renunciations and affirmations’ (p. 302 in the Book of Common Prayer) are written in some of the most apocalyptic language about good and evil in our prayer book. These statements ask the parents to promise, on behalf of their child, that they will turn away from anything that pulls or tempts them from the love of God and will turn toward the teachings and love of Christ. The three renunciations mention some of the most loaded words in Christendom to modern ears:

Satan

Wickedness

Evil

Sin

The three affirmations use words that carry their own sort of baggage in modern minds:

Savior

Obey

Lord

Religion uses words and phrases that are not generally used in day to day speech, so it can sometimes seem odd to use such words and phrases at all. Why not stick to sunnier, lighter images than heaven, hell and cosmic battles? But haven’t we alll experienced, or at least witnessed, moments of heaven and hell on this earth? Haven’t most of us lived through death, conflict and temptation. Such things are certainly a part of our lives and our world.

Hard stuff is a part of life. We may rather it was not, but looking around us we have to admit this world is full of hard stuff. It is so vey important in our troubled world for people of faith to face the hard stuff with open hearts, made of flesh, not stone. If our faith is to express anything deeper than cheap grace, it will have to make us face the hard stuff, and as our lectionary readings at this time of year prove, our faith tradition certainly does not let us avoid it.

So let’s not face life or the hard stuff alone. Let’s come together as Advent approaches and see what the challenging, ancient and mysterious Word is speaking to us in Keene in 2019.

Our readings for this Sunday are HERE. Note that in ordinary time we are using the readings in “Track 2”