First Sunday of Advent

John 3:30


It's an awful moment when you realize that the hero, the main character in the drama isn't you. I thought that type of moment was going to take center stage in the movie The Matrix. At one point, Neo, who we've been led to believe is the hero, the main character, the chosen one, goes to see the Oracle—a woman who can see who a person truly is, the one who can tell us if Neo is, in fact, the one. Surprisingly, at this moment, she says to the expected-hero, "Nope, sorry, you're not him." And while the movie doesn't play out the way I'd hoped it might, it got me thinking about when that moment came in my own life.


Maybe it was from reading too many comic books and myths, but I always wanted to be the hero. I kept hoping that one day the great quest would fall into my hands or that, in a moment of crisis, I'd know that my moment had come and I could step forward to be who I was born to be. I got used to thinking of myself as someone special.


For me, the awful moment didn't come in one scene. No prophetess looked me in the eye and told me that I wasn't the golden boy anymore. No, I guess, for me, it was more like John's story—one day I looked up, noticed that something had changed, and realized that I was on the decrease. The story was no longer going to follow my adventures.


Reading John's speech, he sounds so content. He sounds like a man who's accepted his role. He sounds almost joyful. How he did that I have no idea; because, I'm not ready to decrease. And when I look around at work and realize that someone else occupies the role of departmental hero—the one who learns so fast, gets things done so quickly, is the "golden boy" who can (as I once seemed to) do no wrong, I cannot look with joy upon their increase.


I suppose there's a lesson in all this about being grateful with whatever role I have to play. The story, after all, is not about me but about Christ. Maybe John got that and that's why he was able to get out of the way and not mope and lament that everyone who used to crowd around him with that look in their eyes were now hanging around someone else. Perhaps I just need to get over my own childhood dreams of being Frodo or Harry Potter or Spider-Man and accept my place in the background as a bit player in the greater story that God is telling.


Or maybe I'm being taught that heroics aren't like the movies portray them. Because, it feels like, saying what John said, accepting that awful moment with such grace, may have taken a hero.


Help me to accept myself, my role whatever it may be in serving you.

Christ the King Sunday

Around this time of year I begin to feel pulled in two different emotional directions. On the one hand, I'm excited that in a few days we'll crank up our collection of Christmas music, put up our decorations, and enjoy the fact that the holly-jolly time of year has come once again. But, at the same time, I'm a little sad. The few CDs that are marked to be played only in November will soon be stowed away, for another year. And as much as I love the fun and activity of December, I have equally grown to love the quiet weeks before Thanksgiving when night falls early and it seems the holiday season will go on and on.


In the midst of this time comes Christ the King Sunday (or, if you want less masculine and medieval language the Reign of Christ Sunday). It's a rather new, liturgically speaking, day in the calendar. One that, it seems to me, most people are still trying to put a finger upon. Not to say that I have. But as it rolls around, it's a day that blends rather well with how I feel both about the season of the year and the season of life I'm currently living through.


Right after Thanksgiving this year we plunge once again into Advent—a season that celebrates not just waiting but anticipation. We look forward not just to Christmas, but to that future advent. Something (someone) is coming, we know. Something new and wonderful and life changing (which means it's probably not something you'll find at a Black Friday sale) is drawing near. It's something that we've long been waiting for and, man-oh-man it's nearly here.


But this Sunday and the week that follows isn't yet in the Advent season. It's still Thanksgiving time which is about what is. It's about the right now including the people (and animals) who are a part of that now. It's about where we are in life, what we're doing. It's a time to look around and be thankful for it all.


That should be easy for me. With, as the prayer says, the "loving care" that surrounds me, I should be able to bask in this quiet present rather than want to rush on to the breathless anticipation that comes when the long wait is nearly over. I should be taking in the moment rather than looking toward the eastern horizon for a glimpse of what's on its way. Because, I should be able to see that what is coming is wonderful, yes. But that it is no more wonderful than what has come and what is.


This Sunday, to me, we are called to remember that Jesus has already been placed above every name. It's a day (and a week following) that, in the midst of my beginning to look toward that future redemption of all things, I must also turn my eyes to look around and see that redemption is already happening. It's a day to remember that even in the period of waiting, when things seem like they'll never change; there is a moment that contains its own joys and, I suppose, its own piece of redemption.


And it's a day to remember that even as I wait I cannot forget to be thankful for this moment that not so long ago I was waiting for with anticipation.


Thank you for the moment.

Second Sunday in November

There's a Rush song—"Ghost of a Chance"—that discusses the various twists and turns of life, all the different avenues our choices have taken us. It's a song that makes me think about the strange avenues I've walked down, the many bizarre paths that, somehow, led to a moment a decade ago when I sat across from the love of my life in a Chinese restaurant. And while November always makes me think about that long-ago-but-yesterday time, it's not just the big anniversary year that turns my thoughts back then.


I've hinted here and there in these writings that we're going through one of those transition points in our life. I finished seminary in the spring, we moved, started new jobs, and, ever since, have been unsure what the next ten years of our life together may hold in store.


Lots of people find times like this exciting. I don't. I hate, despise even, these sorts of times. It's as if I've rushed across town, fighting ten kinds of traffic, just to get somewhere on time to find the person behind the desk asking me to sign in and take a seat. Oh, and no, they have no idea how long my wait will be.


It's in these times that all the doors taken and those left closed (or those locked tight) come to mind. I begin to wonder if I did the right thing here. Did I make the right choice? Should I have taken that path instead of this one? Am I lost or, if I've taken some sort of wrong turn, can I find my way back?


These thoughts have plagued me for months. Now, here in November, I find myself trying to be thankful for the people, places, and things in my life. And, you guessed it; I'm having a little trouble being thankful for the waiting room within which we've found ourselves. I'm struggling to say thank you for this blind alley, the one that either leads nowhere or, when we finally make our way back to the road, will turn out to be miles away from where
we want to be. Is there anything to be thankful for? If I'm lost and wandering, doomed to stumble around for another thirty-odd years in the wilderness, is that really something for which to be grateful?


The irony of the moment, of this time of year, is that even as I think about where I am, how I have no idea what's next and struggle with hope that something is coming, I look over and see the girl I had to work up the courage to ask to lunch and then to dinner. And I remember a job—like now—that I wasn't thrilled with, long years of night school ahead, and no real plan for the next year, much less years, of my life.


And I remember that I had no idea that my whole life, my whole world was about to change.


One-who-will-be, thank you that I don't know what tomorrow brings.

First Sunday in November

There's a prayer I like to read each day during November. While reading it aloud a year or two ago, a friend of mine remarked on a line that offers thanks for the "failures and disappointments" we encounter. "I'm not there yet," she said. Yeah, me neither. But I get the nagging feeling I probably ought to work at getting "there.'


Neither disappointment nor failure conjures up feelings of thankfulness within me. And, if it's okay with you, I'd like to take this week to explore them. Why? Well, if you're like me, you're looking at those two words and not seeing a lot of gratefulness. (And if you're not like me…well, you can always get started on Christmas shopping). Plus, if I truly believe that God can redeem anything, I suppose I should even be thankful for the closed doors and the life that hasn't turned out like I planned.


Tied up with the feeling of disappointment are expectations, which always get me in trouble. If I'm really expecting the new Connie Willis book for Christmas but don't see it after every present has been opened, then I'm going to be disappointed. Now I'm not at the point of saying at the close of the day, "Oh thank you God that I did not get that book," but I can see not being all upset about things. There's always next year.


But while expectations play a part, sometimes the expectations are more hope than anticipation. Such as, I had hoped that after finishing my undergraduate and seminary degrees my life would be different. I thought that this awful feeling of wandering around lost would finally dissipate. I believed that my life would have a sense of purpose, and I'd rise up every morning to pursue a calling rather than drag myself into the cold to go to a job. I hoped my life after these experiences would not be like my life before them.


So when I look around in my work day and see the same surroundings I did before or when the past few years of my life seem like an interesting diversion that, like a ride on the midway, has come to an end, I feel disappointed. In fact, my disappointment threatens—more than I'll ever actually admit—to turn into despair. And I've no idea how to say thank you for such a god-awful feeling.


Yet, for some reason, I still feel that maybe I should be thankful for what I feel. I don't mean should because of some obligation, but because of me and, more importantly, my relationship with the Divine. Maybe saying thank you for the times when things didn't turn out as expected or hoped for is just a way of acknowledging that I don't know everything, particularly how my life is supposed to turn out.


Or maybe it's just a way of saying I love you to a friend who's stuck close when the path did not lead where perhaps either of us was expecting to go.


My friend, my companion thank you for not abandoning me even if things did not turn out as we'd planned.