Fourth Friday of Advent
Reflection:Friday, Day 27 of Advent
Read the Scripture here first.
By Chris Pipkin
Here’s the last Antiphon of Advent, “O Emmanuel”:
O Emmanuel, Rex et legifer noster [O Emmanuel, our king and our lawgiver,]
exspectatio Gentium, et Salvator earum: [the hope of the nations and their Savior:]
veni ad salvandum nos, Domine, Deus noster. [Come and save us, O Lord our God.]
The context for Isaiah’s prophecy is, in a way, the opposite of the prayer “Come and save us.” King Ahaz of Judah is in trouble and plans to appeal to Assyria for help against two nearby nations. The Lord, of course, wants the Kingdom of Judah to trust him rather than Assyria, so much so that he tells Ahaz to ask for a sign, any sign, that he will be with him. The idea is that the current problems Ahaz is facing will be gone by the time the child Immanuel comes to maturity—and that by that time, Assyria, rather than being Judah’s helper, will be its enemy.
Ahaz refuses to ask God for a sign at Isaiah’s prompting (“I thought the Lord didn’t like people to test him!”) But God sees through Ahaz’s fake piety as only God can: “Oh, I guess it’s not enough for you to annoy other nations—you need to annoy me too, huh? Very well, I’ll give you a sign, whether you ask for one or not!”
The “sign” Ahaz doesn’t ask for is a child named “God-with-us,” who will still be a youngster when Assyria, Judah’s new “friend,” becomes its oppressor. The irony of the name is that—in the parlance of battle and alliances in the Hebrew Bible, when God is “with” a nation, it means he is on their side, helping them win. He would have saved Judah from its enemies if Ahaz hadn’t determined to do things his own way. Ahaz fails either to believe that God is on Judah’s side, or else he fails to believe that God has power to intervene. Having an adolescent around named “Immanuel” when Assyria began to threaten Judah’s independence would be (depending on how one looks at it) a giant “I told you so” from Isaiah and the Lord, or else a reminder that God is still with Judah despite Ahaz’s failure to believe.
Ahaz’s false piety is common enough, and it comes of wanting to keep God at arm’s length, well out of our practical decisions. I have heard people suggest that it would be impious, for instance, to ask God for a miracle or even for provision, as if we don’t want to bother him. In truth, it’s almost always the case that we don’t want him to bother us. We have our way of doing things that has generally worked fine for us, after all.
And this is a further irony, because God’s name for this Judean boy growing up under the shadow of Assyria is applied to God’s own Judean son as well, a few centuries later, who epitomized “God-with-us” and was born, not just of a young woman, but of a virgin in every sense of the word. There were, in Jesus’ time, many other kings, as well as ordinary individuals, who did not welcome his Advent—who felt that in Christ, their God came a bit nearer to them than they would have preferred. Hence the attempt of some to make him king, which was really an attempt to consign him to an external sphere of their lives (the political) which required no deep change from them. Hence the false, outraged piety of others: “He makes himself out to be equal to God!” Hence Golgotha.
And the Incarnation, of course, is a second sense in which God is “with us.” Not only for us, but quite willing to commit himself to us in a way no human ever dared believe. He was born among us, a human among humans in the mess and bustle of bureaucracy and dismayed animals (“You did what with our food tray?”) and partial failures of hospitality. And when we experience those same things in our lives, they are opportunities for God to be with us as well—to hallow the unhallowed moments and give us grace to lean on him.
“This can be a miserable time, full of finely-detailed but frustrated plans and common-sense materialistic stabs at happiness that leave us hollow. But it can also be a time when God visits us, in the midst of these things.“
And that’s because of the third sense in which God is with us. The “Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world” sense. When Jesus rose from the grave and ascended to his Father, he immediately made good on these final words, spoken to his disciples by sending his Holy Spirit, so that where two or more are gathered together in remembrance of him, he is actually there in the midst of us. The Comforter, a bit close for comfort.
But again—it is through this indwelling, this habitation, that Christ continues to do his work, not only through us, but in us as well. And this is the case even at Christmas. This can be a miserable time, full of finely-detailed but frustrated plans and common-sense materialistic stabs at happiness that leave us hollow. But it can also be a time when God visits us, in the midst of these things. When you pray the antiphon above, or some of the prayers below, invite him into this mess. I’m not going to promise a new or obvious sign or miracle if you do, but if you ask him, you can count on it—though your faith falters—that he will make you a part of the “Grand Miracle” he has already done, is still doing, and will do.
Next reflection: Christmas Eve!
Advent
Activities
Think about the ways God has been with you and your family this year.
In the midst of preparing for Christmas, set aside time to invite God to be with you.
Pick out gifts for Christmas Eve and think of new rituals you’d like to try. Feel free to see our site for the “Christmas Eve” resource page.
Scripture for 12/16
Passage from Isaiah 7:14–17
Isaiah 60:1-3
Arise, shine, for your light has come, and the glory of the LORD has risen upon you.
For behold, darkness shall cover the earth, and thick darkness the peoples;
But the LORD will arise upon you, and his glory will be seen upon you.
And nations shall come to your light, and kings to the brightness of your rising.
Isaiah 49:6
[God] says: “It is too light a thing that you should be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to bring back the preserved of Israel; I will make you as a light for the nations, that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.”
Isaiah 8:22-9:7
And [rebellious Israel] will look to the earth, but behold, distress and darkness, the gloom of anguish. And they will be thrust into thick darkness.
But there will be no gloom for her who was in anguish. In the former time he brought into contempt the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, but in the latter time he has made glorious the way of the sea, the land beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the nations.
The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who dwelt in a land of deep darkness, on them has light shone.
You have multiplied the nation; you have increased its joy; they rejoice before you as with joy at the harvest, as they are glad when they divide the spoil.
For the yoke of his burden, and the staff for his shoulder, the rod of his oppressor, you have broken as on the day of Midian.
For every boot of the tramping warrior in battle tumult and every garment rolled in blood will be burned as fuel for the fire.
For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.
Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end, on the throne of David and over his kingdom, to establish it and to uphold it with justice and with righteousness from this time forth and forevermore. The zeal of the LORD of hosts will do this.
Literature
“Advent” by Christina Rossetti
This Advent moon shines cold and clear,
These Advent nights are long;
Our lamps have burned year after year,
And still their flame is strong.
“Watchman, what of the night?” we cry,
Heart-sick with hope deferred:
“No speaking signs are in the sky,”
Is still the watchman’s word.
The Porter watches at the gate,
The servants watch within;
The watch is long betimes and late,
The prize is slow to win.
“Watchman, what of the night?” but still
His answer sounds the same:
“No daybreak tops the utmost hill,
Nor pale our lamps of flame.”
One to another hear them speak,
The patient virgins wise:
“Surely He is not far to seek,”–
“All night we watch and rise.”
“The days are evil looking back,
The coming days are dim;
Yet count we not His promise slack,
But watch and wait for Him.”
One with another, soul with soul,
They kindle fire from fire:
“Friends watch us who have touched the goal.”
“They urge us, come up higher.”
“With them shall rest our waysore feet,
With them is built our home,
With Christ.” “They sweet, but He most sweet,
Sweeter than honeycomb.”
There no more parting, no more pain,
The distant ones brought near,
The lost so long are found again,
Long lost but longer dear:
Eye hath not seen, ear hath not heard,
Nor heart conceived that rest,
With them our good things long deferred,
With Jesus Christ our Best.
We weep because the night is long,
We laugh, for day shall rise,
We sing a slow contented song
And knock at Paradise.
Weeping we hold Him fast Who wept
For us,–we hold Him fast;
And will not let Him go except
He bless us first or last.
Weeping we hold Him fast to-night;
We will not let Him go
Till daybreak smite our wearied sight,
And summer smite the snow:
Then figs shall bud, and dove with dove
Shall coo the livelong day;
Then He shall say, “Arise, My love,
My fair one, come away.”
Song
“Come, O Come, Emanuel,” Traditional Choir
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