The Turn of the Cycle, First Sunday of Advent

Once again the cycle turns and I find myself at the beginning.  And as I sat in church on the First Sunday of Advent I recognized that the Jews, and then the Christians, had it right when they formed their calendars.  There was always what I would call a secular calendar marking time based on days and cycles and seasons, and there was a second calendar, a sacred calendar, marking time based on the presence and action of God in the work of deliverance and reconciliation.  Despite this dual marking or remembrance of time, we tend to order our lives by the secular calendar with seasons bracketed by holidays, vacations, deadlines, paychecks, appointments, retirement, and dozens of other mile markers.  And that calendar, the secular one, tends to be so filled up that it's easy to forget the sacred, the spiritual ordering of our minds, hearts, and souls that should somehow be more real and meaningful.   The world moves on, year after year, but even as it does God is still at work, still present.  And it should be the sacred calendar that brings us back to the underlying reality of what is true and right in our lives.

That is why I begin each year by buying a new calendar book, one that is formatted to fit the secular year from January 1 to December 31, one that has all of the pre-printed reminders of things the publishers feel we ought to be aware of.  Some are useless; for instance, why give me four years of important dates reminding me that New Year's Day is on January 1 each year.  Some are bizarre; who did lobby to get Administrative Professionals Day started and put on the calendar?  And a few are useful; for instance, knowing when Canada Day was would have prevented me from visiting the Canadian side of Niagara Falls on that day with all of the other thousands of Canadians.  But what I do with this new calendar is immediately pencil in the liturgical calendar for the year, placing the dates and seasons that have to do with God's work within our world, and, by extension, God's work within my life.  Thus it is I find myself back at the beginning of the old, old story with a full four weeks until the end of the secular year.  And it is my hope that I receive the story fresh and new as it begins its retelling, and that I find my own life once again woven into its context and storyline.

Spiritual Service of Worship

Some weeks back both my wife and I were independently struck with this question part way through our church service, “Why is worship always associated with singing?”  We asked this question because we go to a church that is overly fond of singing, to the point where singing appears to be the only way in which they can really feel that they have worshiped God properly.  You won’t hardly find a formal book-prayer, or a moment of silence, or a prolonged period of introspection anywhere.  What you will find is the usual evangelical formula of song progression that mixes exuberance with solemnity and tries to bring everyone into the presence of God.  I would think it should be the other way around.  Maybe we should first check if God is in the house, then behave accordingly.  Once again I think this attitude stems from the lack of comfort we have in just living our lives as followers of Christ.  We cannot conceive of holiness as anything other than something we do, and so our tithes are not just our freely-given support of the church but the building up of the Kingdom of God (just how much input does He rally have in our annual church or home budgets anyway?), our outreach is always done somewhere "out there" on the mission field, and our worship is always in church and when we sing.  But I read Romans 12 and it says “present yourselves a living and holy sacrifice (sounds church-like to me), acceptable to God (a good thing to do what He wants), which is your spiritual service of worship (there is that troublesome word).”  Somehow that does not sound so much like something we do only on Sunday in a gathering of people accompanied by musical instruments.  It sounds more like day in and day out being a good spouse, an active parent, a faithful employee, a just employer, a man or woman of your word…that Paul says is truly a spiritual service of worship.  Or to summarize the prophet Micah’s take on what an act of worship is that brings us into the presence of God (Micah 6:6-8), it is to always act justly in every situation; to deal with kindness and compassion in every circumstance, and to walk humbly before and with the God who has called us.

When Life is Less than Ideal

There seems to be some level of realization within each of us that the way things ought to be does not match the way that they really are.  And somehow we feel that our religion, our relationship with God, should make things different.  And when things turn out otherwise, contrary to our expectations of what ought to be, we find ourselves uncomfortable.  Rather than just accepting the reality we see, we feel that we need to somehow reconcile it to the ideal.  So when we are faced with disappointment, failure, or even outright evil, we don’t just squarely face up to the challenge, we try to redeem it by proclaiming that God can work through even this circumstance in our lives.  Well maybe that is or isn't so, but we further muddy the waters by trying to understand whether these things are from His hand or according to His will.  Maybe, at that point of disconnect, we can simply live, knowing that there is a taint everywhere in our world, that life is not fair, and all that is expected of us is to do the best with the hand we have been dealt.  I know that does not sound very spiritual, but it does sound very real to me, and I am getting very tired trying to spin every circumstance in my life into some spiritual growth opportunity.  Even if the hand of God is in it, there is no assurance that I am ready or willing to accept what it is that He is trying to accomplish.  But at least I can face it honestly.

I am not going to pretend that I understand everything or that I have an answer for every question by just opening up the pages of the Bible.  The reality of the situation is aptly expressed in Hebrews 2:8, “For in subjecting all things to Him (Jesus), He (God the Father) left nothing that is not subject to Him.  But now, we do not yet see all things subjected to Him.”  We live in the now, not the someday (or the sweet by and by).  The only thing that makes it bearable is the next verse and I paraphrase.  I may not see all things under the direct control of Jesus, but I see Jesus Himself, and that reminds me of all that God through Him has done on my behalf.

Life and Purpose

I was reflecting the other day on whether everything in life has to have purpose and meaning. I can certainly go to the scriptures and run out all the scriptures that say all things work together for the good, that God has a future and a hope for my life, that Jesus came to give me life and that abundantly. But where I have the problem is hearing people describe every event in life as the sovereign hand of God acting to twist the world this way or that to make their life holy and complete. And I wonder whether the things that fill our day are really the hand of God at work, or only just the ins and outs of daily life breaking against us as we make our way. I can certainly see where one could receive a great deal of comfort and assurance into the hand-of-God-at-work view, but most of the confirmation of that tends to be reading meaning back into something that happened to us that had absolutely no meaning or the wrong meaning at the time it happened. I understand where all of these other views of God come from, the ones that liken him to a master clock maker that winds up his creation and lets it run, or the people that question God's sovereign action in everything and tend to see life as generally God's plot lines but without the detail all worked out.

I'm not sure where I weigh in completely on this question, I just know that I never quite feel at ease when someone expounds on how their husband's cancer, or their bankruptcy, or the death of their youngest child was just God at work bringing about a greater good or glory. It always has a hollow ring to it and somehow I don't think that is the way is should be. This musing isn't finished and there will be more to say on it.