Advent Reflection 2015: Week One

If the LORD of hosts
had not left us a few survivors,
we would have been like Sodom,
and become like Gomorrah. (Isaiah 1:9)

“Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son,
and they shall name him Emmanuel,”
which means, “God is with us.” (Matthew 1:23)

The story of the coming of Jesus opens with reminders of the tentativeness of ancient Israel’s existence. In the extensive genealogy listed by Matthew in the beginning of his account of Jesus, he separates the generations between King David and Jesus by indicating those who lived before being deported to Babylon and those who lived after that time of exile.

The Old Testament has numerous references to the time of exile, usually expressed in laments and cries for God’s rescue of his people. Isaiah recognizes that, had there not been a remnant that was allowed to remain in Jerusalem, the city would likely have not survived. Regardless of the responsibility the people felt about why this had happened to them, the sense of abandonment is not difficult to find in the Bible.

By the time of Jesus’ birth, the Jewish people were, for the most part, living in their home country again, but were now under the rule of foreign oppressors. There would surely have been many who would continue to wonder when God would rescue his people, forgive them for generations of rebellion and idol worship, and restore Israel to its rightful place in the world. It would seem to many that God continued to have his back turned and was still demanding that the people measure up to his demands through strict adherence to the laws of Moses.

Into this time of isolation, Matthew has the audacity to quote the prophet Isaiah and use his words to frame the birth of Jesus: He will be called Emmanuel—a Hebrew name which means God is with us. The message is startling: God is not absent, his back is not turned. God is not waiting for adequate religious performance before he will act. He is present, he is with his people, and he is with them in the birth of the baby who is named Jesus.

We revisit and rehearse the season of Advent every year because it is there that our own stories find meaning. We live in a world so violent and threatening that news of death and destruction become commonplace to us. There is enough information available that reminds us that we live on planet earth tentatively, and the health of our world depends, it seems, on human intervention to heal its wounds—wounds that we have largely inflicted by our own power. It seems that we must intervene, since we have come to believe that we are alone in the universe.

Into this precariousness, this tentativeness, the words once again echo in our minds as we rehearse our story anew: "They shall name him Emmanuel, which means, 'God is with us.'"

We are not alone.

A Lenten Reflection for March 15, 2013

For he satisfies the thirsty, and the hungry he fills with good things. Some sat in darkness and in gloom, prisoners in misery and in irons, for they had rebelled against the words of God, and spurned the counsel of the Most High. Their hearts were bowed down with hard labor; they fell down, with no one to help. Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble, and he saved them from their distress . . . (Psalm 107:9-13)

What then are we to say about these things? If God is for us, who is against us? (Romans 8:31)


It is usually at Christmas time that we sing songs about Jesus that employ the Hebrew name Emmanuel—God is with us. But we ought to sing songs like that all year round so that we never, never, forget that God is truly with us.

God’s withness is not meant to be an abstraction of theology. The Bible speaks of God as the One who allows his people to suffer the consequences of their actions and choices, but who also meets them in their desperation, hears their cry, and rescues them. God remains with us even in the worst of circumstances.

I once knew a woman who told me that, as a young teenager, having suffered through more pain than a kid should have to endure, she made a decision to stop trying to be good and to embrace the hard-drinking party life. And she told God she was going to do that. She said that she heard God say to her, “Alright. I’ll go with you.” Years later, when she cried out to God in her alcoholic desperation, he rescued her. She still carried the burden of her recovery, but she knew that God continued to be with her.

I’ve thought a lot about that over the years. Does God really stand by us when we deliberately choose paths that will inevitably result in pain and suffering? I believe that he does. I can imagine God standing next to that young, angry teenager, carrying the pain of her life on his shoulders while she vainly tried to medicate her agony. He said he would be with her, and he was.

And when I think of God doing that, I see Jesus.

Jesus was soundly criticized for coming alongside people considered to be sinners. But in Jesus the face of God was revealed in a way that scandalized those who thought they were above sin. But the sinners knew they were sinners, and Jesus knew that, too. He came alongside them and entered their pain. They took his hand as he reached out, and he rescued them. Jesus was with them.

God has, in human skin, become Emmanuel to us. Jesus is with us.

Where was God?

I stood yesterday over the huge bin of shoes, the smell of old leather hanging in the air like a dim memory. A young woman standing near me was weeping. I saw a small shoe among the thousands that the Nazis took from the Jews. It looked about the size that one of my grandsons wears.

The Holocaust Museum in Washington DC provides visitors with a startling, heart-breaking experience. That such a horrific series of evil events could occur in recent history is almost unthinkable, but the museum refuses to let the story die.

People have to ask, after witnessing the accounts of the genocides of World War II: "Where was God?" I asked it a number of times myself. But it occured to me that maybe God was doing what he always does--calling the church and the world to enact his justice, to rescue the oppressed.

Maybe too many weren't listening. Many German leaders--leaders in both the church and the state--listened to Hitler, but not to God. Nations--including the US--shut their ears and refused to take in the persecuted strangers, allowing immigration limits to trump the call to alleviate human suffering and to provide care for the stranger.

Others, however, did listen. Denmark protected its Jewish citizens from Nazi demands. The Dominican Republic took in 100,000 Jewish refugess. Faithful Christians and people of good conscience protected as many as they could, often suffering harsh consequences for their courageous acts of rescue.

I believe that God was at work during that dark time in world history, not only suffering with the oppressed, but also calling out for people to stop the machinery of terror and rescue those targeted by Hitler's insane, murderous schemes.

I wonder what our ears are closed to right now? I wonder what my ears . . .