Musical Prelude and Service.

Isaiah 64:1-9
In the television show Reservation Dogs, we are introduced to several young characters. One; who goes by the name Bear, has a spirit guide. In one episode, Bear is continuing to struggle with the grieving process over the death of a good friend named Daniel. In a conversation with his guide, Bear makes the comment that he knows he just must get over his grief.
The response is profound. I quote the guide as much as possible while editing for some language.
“Get over it? You haven’t even gone through it yet.” He goes on to describe the many ways people engage in grief, including radical hair cuts, tattoos, changing the way they dress, physical harm – you can go on.
“We tear ourselves to pieces so that we can build ourselves new on the other side. You go through all of it so that they know that they can go. That as much as we’ll miss them, that we’ll be okay without them.”
Hope comes in many different shapes and shades. Hope is often incredibly personal. What hope looks like can and often does depend upon the person we speak with. Everyone has their own hope. It is dependent upon the circumstances of their life. It is dependent upon the grief or the pain and hardship they have endured.
But hope can also be a communal experience. Communities and societies have a hope cantered around the aspirations and the challenges faced by the collective.
In the reading this morning from Isaiah, we hear Isaiah pour out his pain and his anger, his doubt in a rage to God.
O that you would tear open the heavens and come down, so that the mountains would quake at your presence.
While acknowledging the sin of his people and the estrangement from God that they experience, Isaiah also places the blame on God for disappearing.
You have hidden your face from us and have delivered us into the hand of our iniquity.
What have you done to us O God. Why have you made us suffer as we have suffered.
This passage is part of what is often referred to as Third Isaiah. The first part of this large book is the warning that as the people, the rulers of Israel have sinned. As they have exploited the poor and ignored the warning of God, they are about to be invaded and conquered. The second part of Isaiah is written for those in exile – again, with questions of how they ended up in this situation. It starts with incredible lamentation and questioning, but it ends with the promise of return and joy. It culminates in the words we have come to know so well: You shall go out with joy and be led back with peace. All the trees of the field shall clap their hands.
Isaiah three brings the people of Israel home. But all is not well.
They are living in the rubble of what was once Jerusalem. The people who remained are not thrilled with those who have returned. There is conflict and heartbreak and disillusionment. The notion of a return of the line of King David is fanciful. The temple is no more and the thought of rebuilding it is hard to imagine.
And so, the prophet cries out: Where are you God? Do something and make it really obvious that you are there and working with and for us!
And then he says, Yet, O Lord, you are our Father; we are the clay and you are our potter; we are the work of your hand.
Get over it? You haven’t even gone through it yet.
Hope is a tough and difficult word. To have hope means we need to acknowledge the pain and the heartbreak and the brutality that is far too often a feature of our lives. It means taking time to imagine that the world, our lives, can be something different.
Today is the first Sunday in Advent. We are beginning the preparation for Christmas. That season when we celebrate the news that God comes to us in the form of a newborn child. That God does not abandon us, but chooses in fact to live amongst us; experiencing all that life has to offer us.
We are inundated in the weeks to come with messages of joy. Of happy families gathering and celebrating all the love and generosity that this world can offer. We are encouraged to participate in this response to the Christmas story; an image of calm and peace. A family’s love and the promise of wonderful things to come in the new year.
And that is all valid. I’m not here to tell you that is all a fiction. But I do want to take time to insist that it is only a part of the story. The heavens are indeed ripped open, and God does come among us. It takes a while, but nations tremble at God’s presence. God’s name is known.
People are crying out for God and God hears them. The story of Christmas is a story that acknowledges that not all is right with the world. It is a story that points out the need for healing in the world. The story of Christmas is one that asks us to name the grief; the pain and the injustice that is so much a part of this world, and to stop pretending that it doesn’t exist. Or that it is something we just need to get over.
We need to take time to wear our grief, cry out our pain and seek the ways that God has chosen to live beside us; bearing our pain and hearing our calls fur justice and for peace. It is a time for us to remember that God is changing the world and invites us to join in the journey and the work of creating that new world.
Hope is a gift. As are the gifts of peace and joy and love.
And yes, we should be grateful for these gifts, but what do we do with these gifts? Do we say thank you and then put them aside to gather dust and forget about them for the rest of the year?
Or do we find a way to wear that hope along with our pain and ask how can we turn that hope into a new world?
What does hope look like?
What does hope look like for the person who is grieving?
What does it look like for the person who struggles to put food on the table for their family?
What does it look like in Ukraine? Or to the people in Israel? Or for those in Gaza?
If we hope for a change in our circumstances, does that mean we are empowered to act? To put to use the other gifts from God to create the world we have seen in our imaginations? And can we bring about that world while also honouring and respecting the visions of our neighbours? How can our different visions of hope be compatible?
Can we bring our visions of the world to come into reality without trampling on the hopes and dreams of our neighbours?
Because hope is so much more than our individual responses to a world that is too often cruel or indifferent, I see hope as something we do together.
It is an acknowledgment that we go through our pain and our grief together. We cry out together. We see one another, and we hold each other up and find our way to the other side – together.
So that we can be okay, together. Amen

Music provided with permission through licensing with CCLI License number
2701258 and One License # A-731789