Luke 1:8-20
Once when [Zechariah] was serving as priest before God during his section’s turn of duty, he was chosen by lot, according to the custom of the priesthood, to enter the sanctuary of the Lord to offer incense. Now at the time of the incense offering, the whole assembly of the people was praying outside. Then there appeared to him an angel of the Lord, standing at the right side of the altar of incense. When Zechariah saw him, he was terrified, and fear overwhelmed him. But the angel said to him, “Do not be afraid, Zechariah, for your prayer has been heard. Your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you will name him John. You will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth, for he will be great in the sight of the Lord. He must never drink wine or strong drink; even before his birth he will be filled with the Holy Spirit. He will turn many of the people of Israel to the Lord their God. With the spirit and power of Elijah he will go before him, to turn the hearts of parents to their children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the righteous, to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.” Zechariah said to the angel, “How can I know that this will happen? For I am an old man, and my wife is getting on in years.” The angel replied, “I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God, and I have been sent to speak to you and to bring you this good news. But now, because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their time, you will become mute, unable to speak, until the day these things occur.”
The Harry Potter series begins on Harry’s 11 th birthday when Harry is living with the
miserable Dursley family who make him sleep under the stairs. Harry doesn’t expect anything to
change about that, until suddenly, it does. An Owl arrives carrying a special invitation to
Hogwarts School of Wizardry. Hope, the thing with feathers as Emily Dickinson calls it, shows
up when no expected it.
The Lord of the Rings trilogy begins on Bilbo’s 111 th birthday. He is very old but
something has been wearing on him. Bilbo gives unsuspecting Frodo a ring that we later learn
has incredible power. Hope shines in the palm of weariness and launches an adventure.
The first Star Wars movie begins with those yellow letters crawling up the screen,
describing an evil Empire and a rebellion facing long odds. The first words are C3PO saying,
“We’re doomed. There will be no escaping this time.” But little does he know, the small droid,
R2-D2, by his side has the plans for the death star stored inside him. Hope is deep memory, a
way where there seemed to be no way.
And long before those great stories, the Gospel of Luke begins during the reign of King
Herod when an old priest named Zechariah was chosen by lot to enter the sanctuary of the Lord.
Zechariah is a dutiful man who lived with what we’d now call the quiet grief of infertility. We
suspect he had made peace with his lot and wasn’t expecting anything unusual to happen in the
sanctuary of the Lord that day. Until it does. An angel announced that he would be a father.
Zechariah doubted that. Anyone would. But then, Zechariah was struck mute for months until his
son, John the Baptist, was born and named. Hope requires paying attention.
What do all these plots have in common? In all of these grand stories, no one realized at
the time that they were at the beginning of a story that would change everything. The great
stories always seem to start this way, with weariness and long odds and plenty of doubt. Far from
Great Expectations, if anything, these stories begin with the lowest of expectations from
unsuspecting folks.
Harry wasn’t watching for an owl through the window. Frodo was not dreaming about his
great leadership opportunities. R2 wasn’t winking at the camera with secret confidence. And
Zechariah certainly did not have “seek out angel investor” written on his vision board. We can
believe it when it happens this way in the movies, but how about in real life? When hope was
being born in our world through Jesus Christ, God chose unsuspecting folks who had long since
packed away their big hopes and started an adventure. Their main job was paying attention, not
being too full of explanation or distraction to see it.
I suspect many of us today are unsuspecting too. We don’t think much will change. We
are weary and cynical. Our attention is being harvested for profit. These are symptoms of
extreme hope fatigue. When this sets in, we might even argue with angels, like Zechariah did, if
someone suggested our lives, our country, or our world were on the cusp of great joy.
What if we thought about Advent differently? What if Advent weren’t a long list of
things we have to do before December 24 th arrives, all these small special but exhausting
routines, but instead a promise that something joyful and quite unsuspected might be happening
all around us. Might be happening through us. What if during Advent our main job is to pay
attention. To pay attention as deeply as we can. To be silent as often as we can, so that, like
Zechariah, we might not talk ourselves out of the joy that God has in store for us.
Andrea Gibson is my favorite poet these days. When cancer came back with a vengeance,
Andrea learned the news on the computer. That was easier than reading it on the sad face of a
loved one or waiting too long to hear a doctor say it out loud. For several years, the only news in
the portal was boring, just another a sad health ritual. But this time, the news was this angel of
mortality staring Andrea in the face, but instead of feeling icy terror or numbness, Andrea began
to feel everything. Life opened up, like a new birth.
Andrea said, “I refuse to spend the end of my life, no matter how much time it is, whether
it’s two months or it’s 20 years, I refuse to spend it not loving my life, and that doesn’t mean not
feeling…You can’t shut yourself off to grief without also shutting yourself off to joy. You have to
think of it like a kink in the hose. You stop the flow of sadness, you stop the flow of happiness at
the same time. So, I’m crying about twice an hour and then I’m bursting into laughter. So, it’s
feeling it all. To be open to this moment and to the aliveness of this moment.”
Advent is ultimately the adventure of life spent with Christ. It’s almost the same word.
And like Jesus said, seek and ye shall find. If all you expect to see is hypocrisy and
disappointment and doom, you will find plenty of it. But seek something miraculous, seek
someone being born, seek ways to serve and forgive and live into your calling and witness
beauty, and you will find it.
I remember one Advent when Grace was in elementary school, I forced myself to sit
quietly and pay attention. Grace was practicing her writing. She wrote the word hope. Then she
said, “Hope is like nope… just with a longer neck.” I have thought about that moment for years,
hope is a nope that is craning its neck. I didn’t do anything to create the joy of that moment, or
the layers of miracles within it, I just paid attention.
Advent is a word that means coming toward. In Ancient Rome, Adventus was a political
event. Adventus was all the pomp and circumstance, political theater and propaganda,
surrounding an emperor or other high-ranking official coming to town. In preparation for this
visit, towns constructed those famous arches, prepared lavish feasts, and made new coins with
the word ADVENTUS… all to say this is the legitimate ruler. This is who is in charge. This is the
what authority looks like. So, imagine what it meant when Christians began to do something
very different. Engaging in deep spiritual preparation, fasting, prayer, care for the poor, welcome
for the stranger, and then called it Adventus. It was a daring affront to the political order of the
day. So, our response to the toxicity, excess, weariness, loneliness, demonization, and extreme
hope fatigue of our politics could be a different kind of Advent. To a bold kind of silence that
claws back our attention. To small acts of faith that might be the beginning of a blockbuster of
the Holy Spirit. To nope, but with a longer neck, hope.
I’ll leave you with this quote from pastor and theologian Reinhold Niebuhr from his book
The Irony of American History.
Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our lifetime; therefore, we must be saved
by hope.
Nothing which is true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate
context of history; therefore, we must be saved by faith.
Nothing we do, however virtuous, could be accomplished alone; therefore, we must be
saved by love.
No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as it is from
our own standpoint; therefore, we must be saved by the final form of love, which is forgiveness. 1