by Jin Cho
This has been such a hard year, and we still have to finish it out in the midst of COVID spikes, the frustratingly unpredictable presidential transition, as well as ongoing racial injustices. There is a part of me that is almost reluctant to be thinking about Advent, let alone Christmas. When I’ve been running on fumes since spring, how can I approach this joyous season with any emotional honesty? The social/cultural distractions of Christmas aside, there is within me a true concern for our collective future in ways that I had not previously experienced. Fear—more than hope, peace, joy and love—seem to rule our land now. Thinking about Advent feels dissonant, sort of like when I yell at my kids to “Calm down!”
Yet, these harsh times have pushed me to remember that when Christians speak of the Coming of God in Advent, we say it with a double meaning—of the God who has come, and the God who is to come. And it is this latter event—the Second Coming—that this incredible season has compelled me to remember. Whatever pretensions of “we got this” have long been cast aside, and replaced with the desperate pleading to God: “O, that you would tear open the heavens and come down!”
Some wise people decided a while back that this prayer of Isaiah would be a good way for us to usher in this season, and included it as part of our Advent Week 1 lectionary readings. In previous years, I had been prone to read it more individualistically, connecting with it whatever personal anguish I may have been feeling—concern for a loved one’s health, existential crisis, etc.
But this year, I think most of us can connect with the communal voice in which this prayer is lifted—this is a communal prayer offered up in communal hope in light of a communal experience of trauma. In the midst of our darkness, we are being trained by our tradition to cry out for the Lord’s intervention: “Oh, that you would tear open the heavens and come down!”—because this is a situation where we need you, here, and now, so “do not hide your face from us anymore!” Isaiah 64 is the Advent collect that we didn’t know we wanted, but we so desperately need.
Now, to say this prayer in a communal way reminds me that for many people this is their daily prayer. As Psalm 80 so achingly writes, some have “fed on the bread of tears” as their regular diet. Marginalized, disempowered people who have lost hope in the conventional means of change do not have the luxury of not hoping for God to set things right again, of not hoping for Christ’s return. Exposure to the virus with no means of paying for healthcare, hate-crimes and micro-aggressions that alienate, systemic racism that eats away at one’s soul—such are the gut-check realities for vast numbers of people in our country every day. Surprisingly, as 2020 has removed the illusory effects of control that blind many of us so used to power and privilege, I have learned to join others in solidarity in this aching hope.
What, then, does it look like to be people who are learning to wait in hope? In Mark 13, Jesus tells us to “keep alert,” “stay awake.” I grew up in a tradition where this meant trying to look for hidden signs of the “last days” in playing music backwards, disambiguating corporate logos, etc., but this isn’t what Jesus had in mind.
Look, like many of you, I’ve had the stressful responsibility of supervising my distance-learning middle-schooler kids. If I were to leave them and say, “Keep alert, stay awake,” I am not saying to them, “Keep looking out for signs of my return.” Rather, I am saying “Act as if I were with you.” You see, we are not waiting here for the Advent of a God whom we do not know; we are waiting for the return of the One who knows us and is known by us—so act as if he is here with us! His Kingdom is here, and we have been invited to do his work.
So it is that in these harsh times, we live into the hope of Christ by not ignoring reality, but by doing Christ’s work of hope-imbuing in a hope-diminished world. In this season, I have been mindful of two ways of doing this.
- We “stay awake” by participating in God’s work of justice in our world. Justice is the work of bringing this Advent hope into spaces of darkness—so speak God’s justice in your spaces, however small!
- We stay awake by participating in God’s work of beauty in our world. A friend of mine posts pictures of his amazing homemade pizza on social media, and every time I see them, I am transported to our New York City childhood in that Ratatouille kind of a way (if you don’t know what I mean, do yourself a favor and watch the movie).
Beauty does that—it reminds us that there is more than what is present. So do your part in creating, or surrounding yourself in beauty. And in so doing, live into Advent hope.
The Rev. Dr. Jin Cho leads C4SO’s Revelation 7:9 Task Force for Racial Diversity and Inclusion. He serves at Holy Trinity Church in Costa Mesa, California as a priest. Jin received his doctorate of ministry from Fuller Seminary, writing on “Race, Evangelicalism, and the Local Church.” He has 20-plus years experience as a pastor and a church planter, but in recent years consults with churches and non-profits to have courageous conversations around various justice issues. He and his far more interesting wife Esther will celebrate their 25th anniversary next year, and they have two extremely extroverted middle-schoolers.