{"id":1033,"date":"2010-12-01T18:11:41","date_gmt":"2010-12-02T01:11:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.peacelutheranseattle.org\/?p=1033"},"modified":"2011-01-08T10:19:31","modified_gmt":"2011-01-08T17:19:31","slug":"pastors-pen-for-december-2010","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.peacelutheranseattle.org\/?p=1033","title":{"rendered":"Pastor\u2019s Pen for December 2010"},"content":{"rendered":"

Be patient, therefore, beloved, until the coming of the Lord.<\/em> \u2013 James 5:7<\/p>\n

To Those Who Await Immanuel,<\/p>\n

As we begin December the pace of our community life and our personal lives gets turned up a notch.\u00a0 There\u2019s always more going on that we can reasonably expect to be a part of!\u00a0 The modern world has done everything in its power to make the countdown to Christmas into a frenetic free-for-all, coaxing us on hectic shopping outings, sowing the seeds of unreasonable expectation, encouraging us to believe that material goods can satisfy spiritual hungers.\u00a0 Infused in all this in times of economic stress is the sense that we\u2019ll never reach these expectations or match our experiences of the past.<\/p>\n

News out of Portland last week of the foiled plot of a radicalized young Somali immigrant to detonate a bomb at Portland\u2019s annual Christmas Tree lighting event adds an additional layer of fear to the season this year.\u00a0 And as conflicts continue unabated around the world, and the enormous costs of war\u2014by every measure\u2014continue to rise, there is a mounting sense of the intractability of the challenges facing our nation and world.\u00a0 Oh! That God would hasten the day when swords are beaten into plowshares and nations study war no more!<\/em><\/strong> (Isaiah 2:4)<\/p>\n

Where is the antidote to this death-dealing mixture of consumerism, fear, and longing to be found?\u00a0 The response to this question, for people of faith, begins with our worship life during Advent.\u00a0 Gathering under the promises of God in Christ, we are summoned to hear<\/span> God\u2019s word of hope and then to act<\/span> as people possessed by that hope.\u00a0\u00a0Good hymnody helps us get there. One of the newer Advent hymns to which I\u2019m drawn speaks honestly and powerfully about our human experience and the promise which keeps hope alive.\u00a0 Written by William Gay, it reads:[1]<\/a><\/p>\n

Each winter as the year grows older, we each grow older too. <\/em><\/address>\n
The chill sets in a little colder; the verities we knew seem shaken and untrue.<\/em><\/address>\n
<\/em><\/address>\n
When race and class cry out for treason, when sirens call for war,<\/em><\/address>\n
they over-shout the voice of reason and scream \u2018till we ignore all we held dear before.<\/em><\/address>\n
<\/em><\/address>\n
Yet<\/em><\/strong> I believe beyond believing, that life can spring from death;<\/em><\/address>\n
that growth can flower from our grieving; that we can catch our breath and turn transfixed by faith.<\/em><\/address>\n
<\/em><\/address>\n
So even as the sun is turning to journey to the north, <\/em><\/address>\n
the living flame, in secret burning, can kindle on the earth and bring Gods love to birth.<\/em><\/address>\n

That \u201cYET\u201d<\/em> at the beginning of the third verse is the fulcrum upon which our life as people of faith turns; that \u201cYET\u201d is Christ. <\/strong> The world tells us that the present, as uncertain as it is, is more<\/span><\/em> certain than the future; that the future is up for grabs; therefore, get all you can while the getting\u2019s good. \u00a0But the revelation of God in the Scriptures is that the future<\/span><\/em> is held firmly in the grasp of the Lord of Love!\u00a0 Because this is so, we can live each day of the volatile present time fully and confidently in the light of Christ\u2019s coming reign.\u00a0 Placing our trust in the God who owns the future, we find our present, too, transformed; tentativeness and fear are transmuted into confidence, peace, and joy.\u00a0 Being grounded in such hope as this is the only real antidote to today\u2019s anxieties and compulsions.<\/p>\n

As we make and carry out holiday plans and gather with family and special friends, let us choose to keep Christ at the center of our Christmas celebrations, our eyes ever drawn to the mystery and wonder of the holy Child within the manger\u2014God with us\u2014now, and to the end of the ages.<\/p>\n

Your servant in hope,<\/p>\n

Pastor Erik<\/p>\n

\n

[1]<\/span><\/a> Text: William Gray, alt. Music: Annabeth Gay \u00a9 1971 United Church Press.\u00a0 Published in With One Voice<\/span><\/em>, (Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress, 1995) hymn #628.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Be patient, therefore, beloved, until the coming of the Lord. \u2013 James 5:7 To Those Who Await Immanuel, As we begin December the pace of our community life and our personal lives gets turned up a notch.\u00a0 There\u2019s always more going on that we can reasonably expect to be a part of!\u00a0 The modern world […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1033","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-newsletter","category-pastors-pen"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peacelutheranseattle.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1033","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peacelutheranseattle.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peacelutheranseattle.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peacelutheranseattle.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peacelutheranseattle.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1033"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.peacelutheranseattle.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1033\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1061,"href":"https:\/\/www.peacelutheranseattle.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1033\/revisions\/1061"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.peacelutheranseattle.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1033"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peacelutheranseattle.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1033"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.peacelutheranseattle.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1033"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}