I love the season of Advent. I love the anticipation of it as we wait for Christmas. I love the calm tone of worship during Advent. Most of all, I like Advent’s color: blue. I love blue. As a child, it was the first crayon scribbled down to a tiny stub. I also used the color maroon a lot, but only because it went so well with blue. You see, blue is not only a color with a hue of amazing depth and beauty, but it is also the bridge between the deadly nature of black and the brilliant assurance of white. Deep in the hue of blue you can literally see blackness giving way to light. Of course, in the color blue, the light has not yet shown itself; but blue offers the hope that it will be coming soon. Like no other, blue is the color of hope. Advent is the season of hope, and blue is its color.
Blue is the color you search for in the darkness of the night when backpacking miles from anywhere in the wilderness. Have you even done that? It is a fearful experience. In the dark you hear all kinds of sounds. Squirrels scampering in leaves are easily hungry bears and a cricket flinging itself against the tent is easily a mountain lion carefully cutting its way toward its meal. In the fear of the darkness, you wait until you see the dark blue sky. It is not quite the assuring light of day, but it is the hope that the daylight will soon come.
In the same way, Mary stood at the tomb of Jesus, before the break of dawn, weeping because her Lord was gone. She was in the darkness…there was no hope. If only she would have looked up to the sky, she would have seen that it was not black, it was dark blue. The sun was about to rise on a new day, and the Son was rising to new life. The night was not black; it was blue and filled with great hope.
And though our lives may appear black, in truth they are not. Advent reminds us that they are blue, filled with hope; filled with the knowledge that God’s light will shine in our lives again.
You might remember that last week the scriptures led me to reflect on Jesus’ return and about Jesus’ judgment when he gets here. I reminded you that Jesus instructed us, his disciples, to do hard things such as loving our neighbors as we love ourselves, and loving our enemies. I went even further than that and told you that when Jesus comes back he actually expects to see you doing these things.
I know that many of you felt these words as words of judgment. The words felt black and created fear. But, if that was the only thing you felt as you finished that reflection, then you missed an important piece. It is a piece that I am going to offer you now: Jesus actually expects us to do these things because through you, God is able to transform the world of the neighbor for whom you cared, and the enemy whom you loved. Through you, God is able to transform those people's lives from a world of blackness into a world of hope; a world of blue.
Last year, while helping the high school theatre students with their scenery, I accidentally overheard a conversation in a dark corner of the stage. Alright, so I was eavesdropping, sue me! But I could not help it because one of the teens was sobbing. Apparently, her parents had a huge, violent fight, one of many, and it looked like the family was over…for good. “I don’t know how I’m going to go on, my world is gone” she sobbed.
The other girl sat and listened. Finally, she said carefully and delicately, “I just want to tell you that I am still here and have an OK life. You see, my parents got a divorce, and it was bad for a long time, but, things are better now...they aren't great, but they are better.”
And then, she said something that I would not have ever expected to hear from a teen’s mouth in today’s culture: “God made sure that things worked out somehow. I know God will do the same for you.” With those words and with an embrace of tears, the fearful teen’s black world turned blue. At that moment she was given hope that the light was somehow going to come. The light was not there yet, but she had hope.
Why does Jesus expect to see us taking seriously his call in the scriptures to love the neighbor and pray for our enemies? Because, it is only when we are together, joined with one another, that he has the power to turn the blackness of the world into blue; death into hope; darkness into hope for the light.
Consider any normal church. As Christians, we gather weekly to read the Holy Scriptures. This is not done just because it is something that we were told to do. It is because, when we read them to each other, we can see the color blue. The apostle Paul says that, “whatever was written in former days was written for our instruction, so that by steadfastness and by the encouragement of the scriptures we might have hope.” Paul further prays that the God of steadfastness and encouragement may “grant you to live in harmony with one another, in accordance with Christ Jesus, so that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Ask any depressed person if they can make it through the tough times alone. Most will emphatically tell you “No.” The search for hope is not a journey that you can take alone. You will get lost in the darkness and fall into a pit. It is a journey that Jesus sends us on together.
Paul continues, “Therefore, welcome one another, just as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God.” This welcome is not a quick greeting at the door just to say hello. This welcome is literally, “taking a person in” or “holding them close.” It is the type of welcome the one teen offered to the other. It is the type of welcome that pulls another person, a former enemy even, into your life so that their blackness may be turned to blue. It is the type of welcome that eventually leads you to sing together the praises of the name of the Lord who brings light to a dark world.
I pray that you can see the implications here? Whenever you see darkness and wrong and sin in the world, the solution is not to declare people evil and simply push them away. Every day I read in editorials and blogs words of hatred against individuals and even entire groups of people. These editorials and blogs paint God’s good creation as being black and evil and wrong. But, we know such words are not the truth. We know that darkness is not permanent. We know that black is not the true color of the world. We know that the true color of the world is blue. It hopes for the light that has not yet come, yearns for the light that is just out of reach, and desires the assurance that blackness will give way to the light of God.
The world desires to have what you have: hope. And, we have it in abundance. We have so much hope that it spills over the lips of our souls. Do not be mistaken, this spilling is not loss of hope, it is sharing hope. Who in your life needs to have some hope spilled on them? Take a moment and actually answer that question, letting God in on the name. Who in your life lives in darkness because no one has told them to look up into the sky and see that it is not black, it is blue? As Paul declares, “May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, so that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.”
All Scripture quotes are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyrighted, 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A., and is used by permission. All rights reserved.
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