Alarming

Isaiah 2:1-5; Romans 13:11-14; Matthew 24:36-44

Hope Can't-Wait, a poem by the Rev. Sarah Are:

Someone once told me that hope was naive— A foolish game that children play

When they pray that summer won’t end, and bedtime won’t come.

Someone once told me that hope was naive as they cradled pessimism in their lap like a sleeping cat, Stroking their ego while they stoked a fire within me.

Unfortunately for them, I’m allergic to cats.

And unfortunately for them, those who deny hope will never know vulnerability;

For hope requires us to believe in a better day — even when this one is falling apart.

Hope looks the 24-hour news cycle in the face,

Hope looks our broken relationships in the face,

Hope looks our low self-esteem in the face,

And declares at low tide that the water will return.

Hope is exhaling, trusting that your body will inhale again.

Hope is watching the sunset and setting an alarm.

Hope is planting seeds in the winter, assuming summer will come.

I never said it would be easy.

The ground is frozen, you are thirsty, and the night is long.

But I will say this—

I have found hope to be the rhythm of love and the fiber of faith;

For to hope is to believe in God’s ability

to bring about a better day,

And like a child with an Advent calendar,

I will always be counting down the days.

So to those who cradle pessimism and fear,

You can find me outside—with the kids—wishing on stars, praying to the God of today

that tomorrow will be just as beautiful.

Set your alarm.

We’d like for you to join us.

The sunrise won’t wait.

Hope can’t wait. That sounds a little antithetical, doesn’t it? I mean if we don’t have to wait for something, what’s the point of hope? Let’s start with what it means to hope. Romans 8:24 ask us “who hopes for what they already see? For hope that is seen is not hope. If we hope for things unseen, we have to wait for them with patience.” Hoping is not the same thing as wishing. A wish is a possibility. Hope is an expectation.

This time of year, this Advent Season, reminds us that while we wait in hope, there is work to do. Sarah’s poem puts it in the simplest terms. We go to sleep as an expression of hope that the sun will rise tomorrow, but if we want to see the sunrise, we must set an alarm to wake up. I would say that the same is true of our faith – that we need some kind of spiritual alarm to see God in our midst – except that there is so much in our world that is alarming today.

I hate to admit this, but every Sunday morning I look at my news feed hoping there is not going to be a tragedy to lift up in prayer. Last Sunday my feed informed me of the shooting at Club Q in Colorado Springs killing 5 and wounding more than a dozen before being subdued by an unarmed veteran who was attending a drag show with his family. Since then there have been numerous violent attacks on LGBTQ+ friendly businesses across the country. There have been other shootings since then that are not related to the LGBTQ+ community, and unfortunately, we’ve become so desensitized about it that it is hard to distinguish one hate crime from another – unless there is one that targets you, your family, or those that you love as though they were your family. We can talk all day about access to firearms and mental health issues, but the cause before the cause in Colorado is none other than complacency and the intentional hatred of pastors just like me.

I say just like me, but – really y’all – I feel fortunate to get to share reflections on the scriptures with 50+ here in the sanctuary and somewhere around the same number online. There are pastors out there preaching to thousands and telling them that the government should arrest, convict, and execute people who are LGBTQ+; that parents and clinicians offering gender-affirming care are child abusers; that public schools are grooming children to be trafficked and abused. In the midst of that, the Southern Baptist Convention produced a document noting over 400 cases of sexual abuse resulting in no disciplinary action (though the report is being considered by the DOJ). Non-denominational Pastors are also being found to commit horrible abuses, and we all know too well about the problems in the Roman Catholic church. That’s not to say it doesn’t happen in the PC(USA). I’m not aware of any cases involving children, but the reason we have a section in our Book of Order on Discipline is because we need a way to respond when charges are made – whether they are proven to be true or not. Friends, people are taking note and rejecting Christianity across the board.

That’s scary. That’s depressing…but wait, there’s more! There’s always more. We’re still struggling with immigration reform, institutional racism, homelessness, women’s equality and bodily autonomy, and changes that have already been made in the fundamental nature of the planet’s biosphere. “Oh, Lord,” we say, “Where is the hope in that?”

I’ll tell you. I find hope in those that see the needs of others and do not turn away. In fact, I believe that is the alarm that should awaken us to hope. I say that realizing fully that there are those who have turned the term, “woke” into a pejorative. These are the same who peddle fear and only offer hope in the demonization of others, and I want you to know that scripture has no time for such banal political machinations. Scripture simply calls us to recognize what time it is, to know that salvation is at hand, and to anticipate that those who follow Christ do not turn and wince over the pain and suffering of the world. We stop. We say, “I see the problem. I see the pain and suffering, and here’s what I can and cannot do about it. Here’s someone else who cares. Here’s some other resource that goes beyond what I can do on my own.” Our reason – our why – is not our fear. It is our hope and our reliance on God.

Becoming awakened to the realities of suffering around us and relying on God is nothing new. Even as Isaiah proclaimed that judgment was coming he assured them that it would result in weapons of war being turned into tools for common work and care for the earth and for one another. In the same way, Paul announced that judgment is coming, and that salvation is at hand, so we must stay awake – we must not fall back into complacency – if we don’t want to miss it!

Paul goes on to tell us not to be consumed with self-gratification but to protect our very souls with the “armor of light” by “putting on Jesus Christ.” This same Christ Jesus is the one who said in Matthew 24 to be prepared because judgment will come like an apocalyptic flood at a time when no one expects it. As terrifying and confusing as all that sounds, we need to remember two things. The first is that he uses language that his followers expected and were comfortable with. They expected God to act as they believed God did in the great flood. They expected God to come in and surgically remove people as they believed that God did on the first Passover in Egypt.

The second thing to remember is that we expect God to show up in places of suffering. We expect God to stand in judgment of our wars and self-centeredness. We expect to see the kingdom of God through the kin-dom of the church. Our hope is surely based on the idea that God has a better, brighter future in mind, and we are not sitting idly waiting for it to pass us by.

We are actively living into the salvation that God has in mind when we deliver meals to the elderly. We are actively living into the future that God has in mind when we offer hospitality to the community by providing a safe space where all are welcome, collecting food for the UCO and the campus cupboard, and by supporting the work of Evergreen Life Services for those with special needs! We, as a congregation, are not simply waiting around like there is nothing to do. No, it’s more like we are madly cleaning the house while we wait for family to arrive!

I don’t know how “woke” we are, but I think we see the pain and suffering of the world and I think we are trying to do something about it. I think we are able to see the pain and suffering that we all bear, and we’re doing our best to bear it together. Sure, we are a community of forgiven sinners, and we can always do better. Fortunately for us, we have time. We have Advent. We have the promise of Christ who might return any minute and upset all of our plans, but we at least have plans and the hope that we have more to do as we live into the justice and judgment of God which bends our assault rifles into farm tools.

You know, there are actually people doing that right now. The Presbyterian Peace Fellowship has endorsed Guns to Gardens which is empowering congregations to become involved in the work of disarming neighborhoods and cultivating community. Rawtools is another group doing similar work. I’m not saying that we need to do it. I’m just saying that it’s being done. I’m saying that when the world’s problems seem too big to handle, we still have hope. Our hope is not based on human might, but in the expectation that God is active and present and moving us toward a better day.

This is the witness of the prophets of old, and the epistles of Paul, and even the gospel of Jesus, but I believe another, the more modern prophet also spoke of hope in a way that inspired action. That prophet is the Rev. Fred Rogers, whom you may not have known was an ordained Presbyterian minister.

In regard to all these alarming and awkward social ills, I think he would advise that we simply talk about them. He once said, “Anything that’s human is mentionable, and anything that is mentionable can be more manageable. When we can talk about our feelings, they become less overwhelming, less upsetting, and less scary. The people we trust with that important talk can help us know that we are not alone.”

While many think of him as an advocate for children who wanted the world to be less scary for them, which he was, Fred Rogers truly hoped we might all be moved to reclaim innocence and vulnerability in a way that we might live into the hope of the salvation Jesus brings.

That offer stands, and Advent is the season to celebrate our hope in the future that God has in mind. This hope requires our action in order to participate in what God has in mind. This hope anticipates love like our bodies expect our next breath – it doesn’t wait. As a people of faith, our hope is grounded in the future that God has in mind, and our work is centered around that hope.

I encourage you, as we move through this advent season, to continue thinking and praying about the things that can’t wait. What is it that God is calling you to do, or say, or come to understand so that we might live in the hope of God’s justice and mercy? What alarms have you been snoozing that have kept you from caring for yourself as God’s beloved or seeing someone else as the same?

May it be that in this season that we find the courage to live into the hope that simply can’t wait to be expressed as love and light; as a breath exhaled in anticipation of the next breath; as the sunrise on a new day; and to God be the glory for all of that and so much more that is yet to be revealed. Amen!