Advent Week 2: Waiting and Preparation

Advent Week 2: Waiting and Preparation

Waiting. It is certainly hard to wait. To pause. To be ready, but not start. This year, we are waiting to decorate the house. We are waiting to play Christmas songs. We are waiting for a time we can spontaneously visit family and hug them again. Yet, waiting is not passive. A season of waiting goes hand in hand with a season of preparation.

Scripture: Romans 8:18-27

Did you pick up that this week's Scripture is a repeat of last week's? We are using the same verses, but will be zeroing in on "wait" this time. 

Verse 19 tells us that the creation is waiting (in eager expectation no less) for God's children to be revealed. Verse 23 goes on to say how we groan inwardly as we wait for adoption and redemption. 

Verse 25 reminds us that we wait patiently for something that we do not yet have. 

We are waiting for redemption (for God to buy our freedom from sin). We are waiting for reconciliation (for God to mend our broken relationships). We are waiting for restoration (for God to fix damaged things and repair broken things). I hope that this doesn't come as a shock to you, dear brother or sister in Christ, but we are not the lead characters in the story of the world. God is the primary actor, director, and technician. We are joining HIM in HIS story, but He allows us to participate and further HIS work. Our dose of hyper-individualism in American culture claims that WE are the stars of our lives and WE are responsible for all the good that we do, but as Christians, we recognize that God gets the glory for the good HE moves us to do for Him. If we give food to the hungry, we should leave thinking "God cares so much for the hungry and He gave me this opportunity to share with them. I am so grateful that God has cultivated this generosity in me", instead of thinking "Wow, I am amazingly generous. God should give me a medal for all the good things I do for Him". 

A season of preparation NEEDS to go alongside with a season of waiting. If I WAIT (even wait patiently) for my garden to grow, but I do not weed the garden, or even plant the seeds, then my HOPE will be disappointed, because I did not PREPARE. We can't just passively wait for the things we hope for, we need to work towards them. If I hope that the captives will be freed, then I need to also work towards their freedom and support after they are freed. 

Song: Lift Every Voice and Sing

This site has a recording, as well as a bit of the history of this song. Here are the lyrics and some information on the song's composer.

I know, I know. This isn't an Advent song. This might be a song that you are not familiar with. In short, this song is known as the "black national anthem", written in 1899. This year has been characterized by raw grief at needless death, lives cut short, and racial injustice in our midst. So it seemed fitting to select this song. There are many others who would be more qualified to perform and muse on this song, but I believe that we all have a responsibility to learn about injustices in our world and share what we have learned. So while there is merit in being silent to better hear minority voices share their experiences of racism and oppression, we also have a responsibility to speak out against it ourselves. As James 4:17 reminds us, if we know the good that we should be doing and STILL don't do it, then we are sinning. This year, I have read over two dozen books about racism, discrimination, and their continuing effects to this day. The stories I read broke my heart as I realized that oppression and discrimination still affect many people in our nation. During my research, I encountered the song "Lift Every Voice and Sing". Let's unpack this song and see how it ties into Advent's themes of waiting and hope.

The song tells people to lift their voices and sing until both heaven and earth ring with liberty. Liberty is not available to everyone in this world, or even this nation, but it should be. People should be free from captivity and oppression. This is clearly something God cares deeply about throughout the entirety of Scripture. 

The song commands people to sing about the faith that we learned from the dark past. This is an ugly side to our history and we MUST acknowledge it if we are to heal. This isn't to say that we hate our country if we discuss the sins of slavery and oppression. On the contrary, it means that we recognize that if we don't learn from our dark past, we are risking continuing the same destructive and hurtful patterns in our modern age. There is plenty that we can learn from the faith of slaves and the hope they had as they waited and prepared for liberty. We can learn from their songs, their stories, and their lives.

The song tells people to sing about the hope we have in the present. We have made improvements in the last 200+ years. Slavery is illegal. Jim Crow laws (which continued the oppression of slavery and segregation of black people after the Civil War until 1965) have been abolished. Housing and employment discrimination based on race is formally outlawed. This are all steps in the right direction. We have hope for continuing to make progress on this journey as the deaths this year have brought awareness to unjust practices in our country. People are learning about systemic racism (the ways that laws and traditions still minimize opportunities for minorities to leave their negative situations. Google "systemic racism" if you are unfamiliar with this phrase) and listening to people's stories of discrimination and pain. There is hope that we will choose to embrace lasting change that will improve the lives of those who have been suffering. 

The song reminds us that victory is not yet won, as we are still marching towards it. It has been a hard road, both full of stones and prone to violence perpetrated against the oppressed. Things felt pretty hopeless in the darkest days, but progress has been made. Slaves sighed for freedom and their descendants received it. Black people oppressed by Jim Crow laws sighed for its end and their descendants saw its formal demise. Black people denied equal rights sighed for equality, and their descendants marched for equal rights and achieved progress. Now black people are protesting for changes in our system to end discrimination, systemic racism, and disproportionate violence against black people at the hands of law enforcement. There have been tears and many needless deaths throughout this journey. As new achievements were reached, there has been mourning for the fallen at every stage. 

The song ends with an address to God. It acknowledges that God was the one to bring people so far and it entreats God to keep people on the right path. 

If we don't actively work towards ending injustice and racism, it will continue to exist and harm people. We can't sit back and expect injustice to just die out. Like a poisonous weed, it will continue to grow and spread. It needs pulled up and burned out of our lives. Systemic racism won't end by people passively deciding to be nice. It will take active work to root out this evil in our nation. 

Questions to Consider: 

-What are you waiting for this year? How well are you using this season of waiting to grow and prepare?

-What injustices are people waiting to be ended in our country and in our world? What can we do to work towards ending these injustices?

-How well do I know the history of minorities? We are fairly familiar with European history and the experiences of European immigrants, but there is much to learn from Asian, African, and Hispanic history and the experience of these immigrants.

-What gains towards justice can we celebrate? What gains were promised (or legally guaranteed), but were not provided or upheld? 

-What are we doing to work towards racial justice and reconciliation? 

Challenge: 

Take time to learn this week: What did black people experience during slavery, during the Jim Crow era, before the Civil Rights era, during the Civil Rights era, and up to this day? In each era, how were people waiting for justice? What did people do to prepare for a more just society to be achieved? How has the ongoing effects of racism and discrimination continued to impact people today? What are black people experiencing today? How has oppression impacted black people over the course of the past 400 years? In what ways has oppression changed over the years and in what ways has it continued to be oppressive? 

The Angel Visits Joseph