We’ve made it to the third Sunday of Advent and finally get to light the pink candle! Pink, because this week our theme is joy. It used to be that Advent was a season of penitence, much like the season of Lent.
Joyful pink, then, was meant to be a blessed reprieve from the heavy, often gloomy work of introspective honesty about our sinfulness and failures.
Joyful pink reminds us that our wait is almost over as our celebration of the arrival of the Christ child nears. The language of joy greets us right away in the opening words of this morning’s reading from First Thessalonians: “Rejoice always.”
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| "Advent Week Three" by Rebekah Krevens |
I imagine that this exhortation may pinch a little as we hear it today. Joy seems a bit out of place, perhaps harder to come by this year, in particular, as we find ourselves overwhelmed by staggering losses, burdened by grief, and captive to uncertainty and fear.
Rejoice always?! Give thanks in all circumstances?! How can we rejoice when so many are suffering and hospitals are full? How can we rejoice when we’re looking ahead to Christmas celebrations that will be missing loved ones and so many of our treasured traditions? Why should we give thanks when hunger and homelessness and unemployment are increasingly devastating realities for so many people in our nation and our world? Paul’s words may ring hollow for you; empty platitudes that seem to ignore our current situation.
It does sound that way, and you’re certainly justified in bristling a bit, but I was heartened to be reminded that Paul is writing to a community from which he has been suddenly and unexpectedly separated. Paul, Silas, and Timothy had traveled to Thessalonica and set up shop, teaching the people and cultivating a new Christian community. But then something happened – we don’t know what – and Paul and his companions were forced to leave. In his absence from the Thessalonian church, Paul was worried that the flame of their newly-kindled faith would be extinguished, especially in the face of persecution.
Following a second visit from Timothy, however, Paul was relieved to hear that the Thessalonians had remained strong in the faith. In this letter, he reminds them of things he had already taught them, and passes along encouragement for their time of waiting and uncertainty. In the midst of their questions and so many unknowns, despite persecution and the looming cloud of hopelessness, one thing was certain: God is faithful.
If there is ever reason to “rejoice always, pray without ceasing, [and] give thanks in all circumstances,” it is this: “The one who calls you is faithful, and will do this.” Whatever happens, we know that we can trust God’s promises, because God has been, and continues to be, faithful.
When we rejoice, when we offer unceasing prayer, and when we give thanks even when things are messy and uncertain, we point to God’s faithful presence in our midst.
I want to be clear that I don’t think our rejoicing and giving thanks are necessarily for the circumstances. We are not rejoicing for the coronavirus, or giving thanks for the death and heartbreak it has wrought. I do not believe that God wills, desires, or causes destruction and pain for God’s people. I don’t find it particularly helpful to hear “this is all part of God’s plan” as a response to very real suffering, loss, and grief. Rather, in all circumstances God is faithful, making a way for us through the wilderness of heartbreak and suffering, and journeying with us as we go.
In the midst of the suffering and heartbreaking losses of these past nine months, I give thanks for a God who never leaves us, and for the hope of resurrection we cling to as people of God.
I give thanks for a God who was right alongside those dying alone, a God whose presence and peace comforts the anxious and lonely, a God who strengthens those who are weary and heartbroken.
I rejoice in the movement of the Holy Spirit, not quenched by our fear or selfishness, not limited by our closed buildings or adapted worship.
I rejoice in the creativity of God’s people – for medical workers, who managed to find ways to care for the physical and emotional needs of their patients, who separated from their usual support systems;
for scientists and researchers, who have quickly and safely developed vaccines that are 95% effective (praise God!);
for teachers, who adapted again and again to different methods of supporting and caring for their students;
for people who sacrificed personal freedom and comfort out of love for their neighbors. I give thanks for the wonder of technology that connects us across the distances. I rejoice in a God who unites us as the Church, the body of Christ, apart from any building or worship time.
Most of all, we rejoice and give thanks for a God who is faithful, who never leaves us, who gives us reason to hope. Our unceasing prayer is that God would be made known in our midst – in times of sorrow and in times of rejoicing. Our deepest joy is that it is so.
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