O that you
would tear open the heavens and come down!
Isaiah 64:1a
So the prophet prays
for his people. It is the cry of a people desperate
for an advent of God. A long time ago they enjoyed the
bounty and protection of the Promised Land, the land given them by God as
promised to their ancestor Abraham. That was a long
time ago. Now life is so different.
Long ago their nation was defeated by the army of
Babylon
. Now the temple is destroyed, the city of
Jerusalem
sacked, and they were taken from their homeland, carried off into exile to
the land of their captors. The prophet expresses their
despair in their captivity.
Their despair
is deep. The prophet prays
For you are our
father, though Abraham does not knows us and
Israel
does not acknowledge us.
Isaiah
63:16a
In exile the promises made to Abraham are gone. In exile it seems to them
that God has left them, or worse, even become their adversary.
So the prophet prays for
them.
O that you would tear open
the heavens and come down, so that
the mountains would quake at your presence—as when fire
kindles brushwood and the fire causes water to boil—to make
your name known to your adversaries, so that the nations might
tremble at your presence!
Isaiah 64:1-2
They feel abandoned, alone, and cut off. They cry out to God: “Reveal
yourself!” They are desperate for an advent of God.
Pam Naylor
teaches high school in
Waveland ,
MS
. On August 29 the storm surge of Hurricane Katrina forced
the waters of the
Gulf of Mexico into
the streams and tributaries near her neighborhood into her yard. The
water had never gotten that far before so she was not too worried. Then
she heard the garage door buckle and soon found the water submerging her
home. Before the water level crested at almost six feet into her house
she and her two cats went out into the storm, crawled on top of the car at
the garage door, and climbed up on the roof. There they huddled together
through the storm’s eye and its returning fury until a neighbor, whose
boat had floated itself off of its trailer, came to her rescue. She and
several of her neighbors plucked from rooftops that day spent the next
several nights at one of the few dry homes in the neighborhood.
Our Mission
Team heard Pam’s story as we stood in her home where we had been working
that day, removing sheet rock and insulation and spraying and scrubbing
Clorox solution to counteract the mold.
As she shared
her story with us she was expressing her own experience of desperation.
Displaced from her home, now living, as it were, in exile in the FEMA
trailer in her driveway, she was desperate for an advent of God.
Few of us
have ever experienced the desperation that Pam faced that day. Few of us
have known the depth of despair shared by the people of God who were held
in captivity for so long. But lest the Word of God today be reserved only
for those in the most desperate of situations, we do, in our own day, in
our own way, long for the coming of God. In your journey of life haven’t
you made the prayer of the prophet your own? Have there not been moments
when you just took the gloves off, let God know exactly what you think,
and shouted from the depth of your soul:
O that you would tear open
the heavens and come down for
a change!
Have you ever been desperate for an advent of God in your own life?
You know, the
whole world must be like that because this season that is upon us is so
very appealing. The whole culture, even as it embraces the greed of
spending and buying and accumulating that so distorts the true meaning of
this time of year, really does long for the promise of peace on earth and
good will to all. From the tune of that Christmas carol turning round and
round in your head bringing back memories of Christmases past to the
anticipation of holiday gatherings with family and friends, there is so
much more to our longing that this season sparks in us than even this.
After all the food becomes leftovers, after all the packages are
unwrapped, after all the holiday guests have gone back home it is the
promise that lingers, it is the hope that sustains. It is the advent of
God we seek, it is God’s coming that we long for. That is what we are
preparing to welcome today. That’s what the whole world is so desperate
for. That’s the real power of this season of the year.
It is
interesting, isn’t it, that we seek that advent always, even after it has
already happened? It is interesting, isn’t it, that we are so desperate
for an advent of God even though God has come already? Over 2000 years
ago God answered the prayer of the prophet. Over two centuries ago God
came down. That advent of God
was not a tearing open of the sky but a bright, shining star
God did not come as a vengeful judge but a loving baby boy.
The mountains were not shaken with fear, for who is afraid of a
little
child, except maybe a demented King Herod?
Every one of us who shared in that mission effort to Mississippi feel that
we made just a small, tiny contribution to the recovery for a community
where house after house after house as far as you can see was severely or
completely damaged by either water or wind or both. They call these
things acts of God. By the understanding so prevalent in our culture,
hurricanes and floods and earthquakes and war are the signs of God’s
coming—the advent of God is known by the destruction, turmoil, and despair
that are left behind.
But this is
Advent—the season of preparation for the celebration of the anniversary of
the birth of the Christ child. In this era of ours when our world seems
to be so inundated by natural disaster and the scourge of war we need this
season of the year to remind us what an act of God really looks like.
Now, more than ever, the church must declare with confidence and boldness
the advent of God—in the birth of a baby in
Bethlehem
, in the generous response of the people of God to hurricane
and flood and earthquake, in the witness for peace and justice.
As we stood
in the bare-framed living room of her home listening to her story, we
asked Pam Naylor if she would like us to pray with her. We joined hands
together and offered God thanks for her safety, prayed God’s blessing upon
her home and family, and again committed our work to the service of
Christ. As we dried our tears and embraced one another in Christian love,
would you understand me when I tell you that we experienced in that moment
an act of God? God came to her and to us right in the midst of that place
of destruction and despair or, rather, we came to see God who had already
come to her in Jesus Christ and had been with her and with us all along.
In this
season we come so desperate for an advent of God. But there is such good
news today. That good news is this: there is only one other who is more
desperate than we in this season. You see, God has already come. God is
just as desperate for you and for me to know that, to recognize that, to
experience that in our lives. As we prepare to celebrate the anniversary
of the birth of the one who has come and is now here, may the good news
make clear once and for all the act of God that changes lives and brings
promise and hope both now and forever.
