What is Advent for us today?

"In the early days of the church, the faithful believed that the end times were just around the corner. But they never came. Two thousand years seems a long time to wait for something imminent. So how long do we have to wait and for what? 

If the Gospel writers thought the end was near, they were clearly wrong. Christ seems to have missed his deadline. And, like waiting for a friend in a café, waiting for a bus in the rain, we check our watches, drum our fingers, and prepare ourselves for disappointment. 

Sometimes, it feels that the waiting in Advent is a bit fake; as though Advent is a ritualised vestige of the time when we waited with true expectation for Christ to come and fulfil all things. Ritualised in Advent calendars and in Advent wreaths, candles lit, doors opened. Ritualised, because in our hearts we know it will not be now, it will not be soon. 

Waiting for Justice to arrive for many seems a long wait. For the ravaged and broken people of Syria, the mountain of the Lord seems very far away. There are no ploughshares left in a land which has more craters than fields of grain. 

For those bereaved, wounded and traumatised by the events on London Bridge on Friday, the mountain of the Lord is a long way from the dark valley they walk through. For those affected by climate change, justice seems to ebb further away, as the waters rise and the hurricane destroys their land and their homes. 

For those who suffer because of their gender or their sexuality or their race, they find that justice is not something they can afford to wait for, because while they wait, they are persecuted, oppressed, broken by an unjust world. 

That is not the waiting we are called to do in Advent, a passive hanging around until God gets his act together. There is no place in scripture where God gives us the indulgence of helpless passivity. If we throw up our hands in despair and ask God how he can let these things happen, the answer in the Gospels comes back clear and strong, that God has in fact given the hungry all that they need to be well fed, he has given the persecuted all that they need to receive justice, he has given the war-torn all that they need to find peace - because he has given them us. He has given them us, and what we wait for in Advent is for the Spirit of God to take us over, to fill us with such compassion that we have to act, because we cannot bear to see so many in such pain. 

The presence of God makes us discontented with a world which should be like the Kingdom of God, but isn’t. The presence of God makes us hungry for justice and hungry for an end to starvation, and corruption, and war. The presence of God calls us not to be content with the world as it is. The presence of God gives us courage to walk the hard road of making change. 

Because to change the world, as Isaiah said, means we have to put down our most cherished weapons, we have to abandon and unlearn the paths we have trod into a world we do not like, we have to remove ourselves from the comfortable myopia that indolence and isolation bring. Advent is where we wait for something that will change us, even though we may be frightened by the change."

Philip Blackledge
Melrose, Scotland

Someone To Run To

"I have said this to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation, but take heart: I have overcome the world."

Story 1.
There was once a man who thought he knew all the answers. He thought he could put God in a box. But he had his doubts. He questioned the realness of his faith.
So Jesus came into his life and told him there was more to life than having all the right answers. His name was Nicodemus. His story is found in John chapter 3. He was a Pharisee, a teacher of Scripture, he was supposed to have things figured out.

For a young person, it’s easy to think that at this age, at a young age, I have all the answers I need for life. I used think I had figured things out, you don’t need wisdom from others, I don’t need the discipline from my parents, from elders, or even God. Because I think I know how to live.
But there are others times as a young person, that I feel like I don’t have any answers whatsoever. I have doubts about God, I have doubts about your faith. I doubt whether Jesus can show up in your life, whether Jesus is the answer, whether this thing called Christianity or this thing called Adventism is worth living.

I see pieces of both in Nicodemus. Nicodemus had presumption, he assumed that he had his faith and worldview figured out, he was satisfied with the life he was living as a Pharisee.
But when Jesus came into the picture, he doubted the things he thought he knew. Because now Jesus turned his whole perspective on life upside down.
So he came to Jesus in the night because he needed to figure things out. And he found that Jesus embraced him as he was, doubts and presumptions, pride and prejudice. All that he was.
Because when Nicodemus started asking questions, when he started digger deeper into his faith, when he started wrestling with his doubts and what he thought was truth, he found a Savior who truly satisfied.

"For God did not send Me into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Me might be saved."

His questions plagued him, his doubts tormented him. Jesus was unafraid of his doubts, Jesus wasn’t stressed about his questions.
Because at the bottom of his doubts, his questions, his pride, his presumption, Nicodemus found a more wonderful, a more satisfying Savior. He found a Jesus who was all whom he truly needed. Nicodemus had more than doubts and questions to run from, he had Someone to run to. In this world, you will have doubts and questions, but take heart, He has overcome.

Story 2.
There was a woman who lived a life drenched in sin. She didn’t know if she was addicted to the abusive captivity of sex or if that was the only life she had known, and she had nothing else to turn to.
But she was trapped. Trapped in the abuse forced upon her by her family, trapped in the arms of sickened relationships, held on tight by the painful suffering of darkness in her life.
We don’t know her name, some speculate her identity, but in John chapter 8, her name is not given. But perhaps with no name, we see reflections of ourselves.
No man seemed to love her, so she kept doing what was doing. If she couldn’t find love, she’d find something that appeared like love. She wanted to run away, she wanted to escape; one day she got her chance.
One day, in the midst of a shameful, embarrassing transaction of sin, the religious leaders stormed in, grabbed her naked body, bound her in arrest, and took her to the public square. She was finally caught.

There in the square stood the teacher, some called Him the Messiah, a man many had talked about, a man people had said was the one they were waiting for. But why did it matter to her. Her cruel worthless life was about to end.
A Pharisee called out to the Teacher,

"'Master, this woman was taken in adultery, in the very act. Now Moses in the law commanded us, that such should be stoned: but what sayest thou?' This they said, tempting him, that they might have to accuse him. But Jesus stooped down, and with his finger wrote on the ground."

Our failures, our sins can take us rock bottom, but Jesus meets us where we are on the ground we have fallen, and He writes His love on the dust.
The woman found that it wasn’t her failures and accusers who had driven her to Jesus, but she found that this Savior had drawn her with His deep and vast love.
She had a dirty, shameful past to run away from, but that didn’t matter as much to this Someone to run to. In this world, you will have sin and guilt, but take heart, He has over come.


Story 3.

"She turned herself back, and saw Jesus standing, and knew not that it was Jesus.
Jesus said unto her, Woman, why do you weep? Whom do you seek? She, supposing him to be the gardener, said unto him, Sir, if thou have borne him hence, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.
Jesus said unto her: Mary."

This story, like the other stories, is about ourselves. We too, like Mary, may wonder where God is. We may not say God is dead, but we may imagine He is absent from us. That He has left us alone. That God has abandoned us. Or we may find ourselves weeping, because we find ourselves in a world without hope. We live in a world full of pain and suffering, violence and troubles, wars and rumors of wars, uncertainty and no peace. And yet amidst all these troubles in the world, we might feel hopeless because the pains of life are too much to bear. So like Mary, we wonder where God is.

Recently, and for a very long time, I had been feeling despair. I felt discouragement. I felt disappointment. I felt like my hopes and dreams had been taken away from me.

Maybe the way I had described Mary doesn’t seem relevant to you, but that assuredly describes my own pain of recent times. I had been wondering where God was, and it was only until I turned around and started paying attention did I realize God had been behind me the whole time. I let my eyes be blinded by my pain and suffering, not realizing that as I mulled over my grief, that God was reaching out to me, that if I turned around, I'd find Someone to run to.

In this world you will have despair and discouragement. Your world may come crashing down on you. Your hopes and dreams may be ignored and forgotten. But take heart, you might find that God has been standing behind you, calling your name. He has overcome.

The thing about pain and suffering is that the more we grow in our faith, the troubles we see in life should not lead us to despair, but that they draw you to hope. Not that you have something to run away from, but Someone to run to.

In this world, you will have things to run from.

But take heart,
take courage,
be of good cheer: you have Someone to run to.

Ryan

Nairobi, Kenya

with writing from Beirut, Lebanon

When darkness seems to veil

"But Moses drew near the thick darkness where God was."

What is this thick darkness in my life where it seems God is obscure, His face is veiled, and I am afraid? Perhaps it is there in the mystery, in the fearful unknown that I find God's presence. Or, where I least expect to find God, He is present.

My whole life feels like thick darkness. Has God been drawing near me this whole time?

Have I been seeking His hand and not His face? Can I trust God and love God even if He will not deliver me? Maybe it won't always be a fiery furnace or a lions' den from which He saves. Maybe it's an environment. Maybe it's a period in life. Maybe it's the place to which He carried me.

Perhaps this whole time, I was meant to seek His face when instead I was seeking His hand to deliver me from this trial. Maybe I'm not meant to be delivered. Not now. Not the way I'm expecting.

"But if He does not..." 

Even if He does not, what do I do?

Ryan

Beirut, Lebanon

I would know in a whale

Lately I have been tempted to put God to the test. I want to run away from God as far as possible, like Jonah. Why? Because I want God to run after me and pull me back. I want to be swallowed by a whale and know that I’ve been called by God. This indifferent attitude of God (not mine) leaves me unsure about my identity, my calling, and my fulfillment. I wish God would grant me more affirmation, more fulfillment that I would know I am meant to be where I am, but I don’t have any of that. I am left discouraged. Is that my fault or God’s?

Ryan
Flying Over the Horn of Africa

Grace Will Lead You Home

As the years come and go we tend to rely upon mere things of this world to fill the emptiness that the past year left in us. But God reminds that He is all we need to fill that emptiness, because His grace is sufficient for us.

With Him we can do more than survive. We can thrive.

As of now

Coming here was probably the greatest jump in my life. Greater than moving to the Philippines. Greater than moving to Kenya. I was taking a chance on my path, my career, my social life, even my happiness.

Yet when I landed here, God was silent. He didn't speak to me like He used to. I didn't have the fulfilling fruits of my labor that affirmed His own work in my life.

Quite often now, I feel alone, incapable, untested, and desperately questioning. I wonder where God's Spirit went, when I was so certain He was with me before.

So where did God go? Will He show up again? Or am I to go in search of Him?

Ryan

Beirut, Lebanon

Sacred space

There was this line I once read that resonated with me in underlying ways: the Christian story is one that begins in a garden and ends in a city. God’s desire for humanity and our environment has been for mankind to work with our world to make it better. Not that God created our world inadequately but that we were meant be part of God’s work of creation and progress. God is love, and love creates and expands and grows; it doesn’t stay stagnant. So for us as humans, objects of God’s love, we in turn love each other and creation and develop love. 

Ryan

Beirut, Lebanon

Yes No and Wait

I find it incredibly difficult to believe that the only three answers that God provides to our prayers are, “yes, no, or wait.” 

When the Adventist Tutsis prayed to God and wrote to their conference president to save them, the conference president replied no. I cannot believe that God’s response was equivocally the same. Who is God to say no to cries for deliverance?

If His answer is not no, then it must be something else.

Ryan

Nairobi, Kenya

Another expat Christmas

Every Christmas, I am searching for Christmas. I am looking for that feeling I had as a child, staring into our Christmas tree, into the lights, pondering deep in thought, there in the loving warmth of home.

When I got to Auburn, I tried to recreate those memories with my roommate. We'd stare at the Christmas tree together, and listen to Delilah on the radio. Since then, I've been searching for Christmas.

I attend as many church services as I can. I wander around the city or the shopping centers, trying to gather the energy of the atmosphere.

I stayed in Nairobi town for  Christmas Eve and Day. The streets were drastically quieter than usual in the city. I attended three services at All Saints Cathedral. The sermons didn't speak to me. I know I could've preached better sermons myself.

But the music and the words always speak to my spirit. This is what I was looking for:

Joyful all ye nations rise
Join the triumph of the skies

Ryan

Kileleshwa, Nairobi, Kenya

I will try

Where are those lights that guide us home? They are people. The solid rocks in your life that you can always rely on. They ones who are always there for you. They are those way marks that carry you to safety.

Ryan

Nairobi, Kenya

Before every sermon

I think I was terrified, but I'm not sure why. You'll always be afraid of your delivery, whether you can make a difference, whether God will speak.

But when its all over, and you go through the rhetoric and you articulate as best you can, there comes an emptiness. Because youre not sure if it was enough or if there was more left to say.

Maybe I was afraid because at the end of my delivery, reality would return after my brief time as a writer and theologian, and I'd have to face the harsh future which I fear.

Ryan

Seattle, Washington

Life together

We live in a divided, broken world. Who would have thought that hatred between red and blue, conservative and liberal, race against race, religion against religion would become so strong, so vengeful? The election was nearly six months ago yet the political polarization remains the same. Republicans play hardball with Democrats. Christians issue violence against Muslims. White nationalists defile immigrants and people of color. And they drag the ignorant with them on a crusade of hate against each other. I know you know. We see it in the threads of Facebook, or the sensationalized debates on cable news. You can’t even go through the day without a CNN alert telling you the world is about to end. This heightened atmosphere of polarization seems to be our new normal.

But we are not broken and divided in public life alone; we too are broken in the church. The things we thought would staple our seams together are falling apart. Endless debates and committees attempt to solve our issues, yet we suffer the same division as the world. Cultural differences pit North Americans and Europeans against South Americans, Asians, and Africans. We struggle to resolve issues that separate us from women’s ordination, to racial segregation, to traditions, to music and culture. And while this happens, young adults and youth bleed out of the church. 

Even amongst ourselves in our congregation, we divide. We come from places at the opposite ends of the interstate. We cling to certain circles, we separate ourselves among cliques and friends, temperament, personality, even popularity. 

Who would have thought that my generation would never see peace in our time again?Who would have thought the height of modern reality would not be unity, but division? That the future would bring hate, not love? That our era would bring separation, not togetherness? Perhaps we should not be so surprised. Scripture seems to aptly describe our world. The words of Jesus in Matthew 24 — “You will hear wars and rumors of wars…Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom…Many will be offended, they will betray one another, and will hate one another…And because lawlessness will abound, the love of many will grow cold.” 

Beyond the talk of prophecies and beasts and images, there is this prophetic insight we should not overlook: polarization, division, and hate will characterize our world. People will war against each other, they will hate one another, and the love of many will grow cold. 

If there was one value missing from the public discourse, I would say it is love itself. Why have Christians spoken evil against Muslims? The love of many has grown cold. Why is racism now a  normal part of society? The love of many has grown cold. Why can the right not work with the left? The love of many has grown cold. Why do we disrespect each other, why can we not find solutions together, why can we not listen to the other side? The love of many has grown cold. Why do we find it hard to live together in this church community? The love of many has grown cold.

So what do we do now? Can we find healing for our bitterness? Can we find wholeness for our separation? Can we stop this bleeding?

Can our church address this issue?  Is there any way that the church can find an answer to the great division? 

But does God care about love itself?

I have wondered if God cared at all about our romantic lives beyond the canned advice of sanitized notions of Christian love. The foundational supposition for God is that God is love, but theology usually implies that in a brotherly sense, or an unconditional quality. But does God understand when our hearts break from the throes of romantic love? Does God care when we suffer from the loneliness that pervades us when we long for the embrace of another body? Can the God who angers at injustice and weeps with the mourning, can he care when you love someone but it goes to waste? 

Does he not bear the pain we endure? Can’t he feel our brokenness, our hopeless romanticism? 

Aren’t there verses in Song of Songs that express this loss? “I have sought my true love; I have sought him but not found him. I have called him but he has not answered. If you find my beloved, will you not tell him that I am faint with love?” 

Or what of the perennial analogy of the broken relationship with God and Israel, husband and bride? Does he empathize with us as when his own heart was broken by love?

Surely this God -- whom we take for granted being concerned with justice, mercy, and grace, a God who is love itself -- can feel the same pain as an angst ridden youth sore from the grief of lost love?

Ryan

Snohomish County, Washington

On the state of the dead with inspiration from Peter Rollins

I have wondered if the Adventist doctrine on the state of the dead has any more meaningful theological meaning than the ho hum antagonism towards spiritualism. I think it can be this: if we believe that when one dies one does not immediately enter the gates of heaven,  should we not be more occupied with the question of whether there can be life before death, rather than whether there is life after death? We believe that there is ‘life after death’ per se at the Resurrection. If Jesus says, “I have come that you might have life, and life to the fullest,” then are we not looking for meaning in life before death? Shouldn't we be teaching about the state of the living?

Ryan

Snohomish County, Washington

On radical religion

I can understand why President Obama refused to describe terrorists groups as “radical Islam” or “Muslim extremists” because if you switched that out for Christianity, a “radical Christian” makes me think of Martin Luther King, Desmond Tutu, or Pope Francis. A person of radical faith seeks to find the essence and goodness of their religion to fight against all that is wrong in the world. I think of Martin Luther King’s Letter from Birmingham Jail: “Was not Jesus and extremist for love? Jesus Christ was an extremist for love, truth, and goodness. Perhaps the South, the nation, and the world are in dire need of creative extremists.”

Thoughts on a mountain

I wrote in my journal sitting in the mess hall of base camp on Mount Kenya.

I remember when I was in the year in between. I felt hopeless and without meaning. I would listen to these songs that when I listen to them now, I relive those dark memories. I keep wondering if I will move on to a more hopeful era in my, or if I will figure myself out even more. Sometimes things seem wonderful, then things come crashing down.

I have a student who told me he had gone through a dark period in his life, and he decided he would rather leave God than go through dark times with God. I didn't know how to respond.

But whether these are good times or hard times in my life, I don't think I've even considered completely abandoning God and faith. I will yell at God, I will be angry at God, but I could never turn my back on God. I don't know how to convince my student to do the same.

Ryan

Base Camp, Mount Kenya

Post holiday

When the night is done and we say our See You Agains, they become mythical figures in my memory. Ones whom I see only in brief pictures and posts. They're lost in distant lands, each of us with lives of our own, and a life we resume together when we come home. 

We are torn between beings kids again or going on with life as adults. But this place in between, where we are both and neither, life strangles us.

Ryan

Bremerton, Washington

On a flight to Seattle

They're not ice floes. They were just clouds. All that ice floating around the northeastern Pacific wouldn't make sense. I guess it's just constantly cloudy in Alaska.

The sun is setting behind me; when I touch down it'll be night and not the hazy waning morning that greets me every winter I've returned home.

I'm traveling home but I don't want to. Except for my family, nothing awaits me there. I have no more close and loyal friends, I have no work, I have no life. 

Haven't I been waiting to be done and home for nearly four years? 

It's like I don't know how to be home. 

I've been a stranger in a strange land for so long. I was comfortable living as a foreigner, as an outsider.

Ryan

Flying Over the North Pacific

Paraphrase: Psalm 107 -- a song of the sea

The seamen go down to the sea in their great ships, 

following the shipping lines through the transient waters

Business they call it, but it is actually adventure to exotic lands

Tarshish, Sardinia, Tora Bora, Vancouver

And they find God there in the vastness, 
in the mysteries of the depths of the ocean

They find God in the broad night sky and 
the silent breezes of the noonday

He may blow the wind and cast the waves 

as high as heaven: he is king over the flood

The ships ride up with them, and fall into the trenches

Their hearts melt in fear, their vessels reeling to and fro

Staggering like a boy from a pub

They are pushed to the ends of faith

So they cry out to God, Save us Lord

else we perish -- and he hears their fears

He commands the storm, Peace! be still 

The waves settle down

And they are glad 

because they have found stillness

The signal is lowered, 

the ship is secure, 

And he brings them home again.

Do not be afraid

Christmas is proof of the 'already but not yet.' 

Jesus comes among us now but he will come to us again.

Ryan

Manila, Philippines