St Paul's United Church of Christ
50 North Main St.
PO Box 129
Manheim, PA 17545
717-665-2447
The Reverend William J. LaSalle, Pastor
email:stpaulsucc@dejazzd.com

Pastor's Message

December 2006

Of all the seasons of the liturgical year, Advent is probably the one least acknowledged by the world. Indeed, secular culture does not simply ignore Advent, it actively contradicts it. While the church tries to cling to a season of preparation and expectations, the world rushes on – prematurely to Christmas – to a time of arrival and fulfillment. This determined avoidance of Advent is at least partly because the theme of the season is one with which our world is profoundly uncomfortable: Waiting.

Modern life regards waiting as a negative act, something to be avoided. Waiting is idleness. Time must be filled, used, made productive. While we wait for a plane, we make calls from our cell phones and work on our laptop computers. Or waiting is a frustration of our desires to get and to have. We do not want to wait to save up for a purchase, so we whip out our gold cards and run up our credit balances. Or waiting is a time of apprehension. We wait for the phone to ring with the results of our tests or the mail to come with a response to our application for work. In all of these cases, we dislike the wait. We want to hurry on, get to the point, get something done.

But consider another side of waiting. In every instance, waiting speaks of our incompleteness, our need for something or someone outside of ourselves. We wait for a plane or a bus or our carpool because we cannot reach our destination alone. We need transportation. We wait for news because others know what we do not. We need their wisdom, their skills. Waiting is needing. More than that, it is trusting that someone will meet our need. Waiting is faith.

We wait for the coming of Christmas, of course. Those with even the least faith can understand that aspect of this season. But the Advent readings point to our needs, to that in which we have faith, that for which we wait – yesterday, today and tomorrow.

This season points us back to the time when God broke into history and the glory of the Lord was revealed. We wait for the revelation of God in a manger in Bethlehem. We need to know that God has acted, and so we wait for what once was.

But this waiting is not a commemoration of history. We need God in our lives now. The promise is given to Mary: the kingdom of her child will have no end (Luke 1:33). The promise is given to us: the one who comes will give us the Holy Spirit (Mark 1:8). We need God with us now; we have faith in Immanuel.

Our need goes beyond today. We long for assurance for tomorrow as well. Advent reminds us that the promise is for all time, even to the end of time. While the schedule is not ours to know (Mark 13:24-37), the reality is, for we are to be part of a new creation (2 Peter 3:13-14). We need hope for the future, and we have faith in the one who comes again.

For most people, what the church calls Advent is simply the pre-Christmas season. It is a time that exists only because of what comes next. For many, in fact, it has meaning only when it is practically a part of Christmas, a time to fit in all of the shopping, mailing, and partying before the season ends on December 25th. What are these weeks about? They are a time of getting and controlling. Advertisers and marketers make it clear that it is a time of year to make our wishes known, to present our lists, and to be sure that we get what we want.

What makes Advent so profoundly countercultural is its insistence that it is a season about depending and trusting. For this reason we wait: Because we can do nothing else. We wait because our needs are so deep. We wait because we have faith that those needs will be met in Christ-mass.

Pastor Cluley