Photo by JÉSHOOTS
Psalm 27:14
Wait for the Lord;
be strong and take heart
and wait for the Lord.
I love this beautiful stained glass in the narthex of First Baptist Church of Salt Lake City. The problem is that almost everyone attending the church never sees it. The sanctuary was designed for people to enter from the opposite end that we enter now. It’s like we’re entering through the fire exit at the front of the theater, but that’s the most convenient entrance from the parking lot.
The only people who see it regularly are those who get called to be ushers for the offering or those participating in special services like Advent. If so, they gather in the narthex and enter the sanctuary from behind the congregation. If someone climbs the steps in the narthex to the mezzanine, they’ll also see it and maybe find comfort in the artistry.
I took this photo in the narthex this morning because today’s Advent candle of hope brought thoughts about Jesus’ desperate prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane. Jesus is fully aware of what is approaching, and his humanity is on full display when he prays in Matthew 26:39, “My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will.“
He had told Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death.“Luke 22:43-44 adds more visualization of the depth of Jesus’ plea: “An angel from heaven appeared to him and strengthened him. And being in anguish, he prayed more earnestly, and his sweat was like drops of blood falling to the ground.“
Jesus HOPES that his prayer might result in the cup being passed. It never hurts to ask. But he concludes his prayer with the HOPE and belief that the Father’s will is the way. The Father’s will can see beyond the horizon than Jesus can; everything is focused on the glory of the Kingdom of Heaven.
The vision that struck me today was the little boy in Jesus pleading with his father not to discipline him for something he didn’t do: the world's sins.
Jesus’ mother, Mary, didn’t want to suffer the ridicule that an improbable pre-marital pregnancy would bring upon her and her family. She might have thought the same prayer as Jesus, even as her fiance debated their future together. Maybe Joseph felt the same prayer in his heart as the angel from heaven pleaded with him to stay with her.
The hope that the angel offered Mary came from her cousin, Elizabeth. The angel told Mary in Luke 1:36-37, “Even Elizabeth your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be unable to conceive is in her sixth month. For no word from God will ever fail.“
If God could enable Elizabeth to become pregnant at eighty-eight years of age, then God could enable Mary’s virgin pregnancy for the glory of the Kingdom of God. Mary is filled with servanthood and buoyed by the hope found in the promise of God; she replies, “I am the Lord’s servant. May your word to me be fulfilled.”
When life presents you or me with a “cup” that is unpleasant, do we not say this same prayer? I have yet to receive an angel explaining the wisdom in the cup I have been presented. How often do we ask God to take it away, only to be met with silence?
Paul tells the Corinthians and us that, like Jesus, we can rest in the hope and belief that God will strengthen us to the end. Better yet, we will be made blameless when our time comes. God called us into fellowship with Jesus; in doing so, we are also presented with our unique cup and the promise it won’t be for nothing. Everything will be made whole.
1 Corinthians 1:3-9
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that has been given you in Christ Jesus, for in every way you have been enriched in him, in speech and knowledge of every kind-- just as the testimony of Christ has been strengthened among you-- so that you are not lacking in any spiritual gift as you wait for the revealing of our Lord Jesus Christ. He will also strengthen you to the end, so that you may be blameless on the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is faithful; by him you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.
I can imagine that Mary wondered if her waiting during pregnancy would be worth it as she screamed in the pain of labor alone with Joseph in a stinky stable far from her home. She wondered if God was there with her and cared for her. What doubts did Joseph have at that moment?
We’re left to wait, wonder, and hope when we pray this Advent season. Like Mary, we must learn to trust that God will deliver on the promise of the covenant signed with the blood of Jesus.
God didn’t leave Joseph and Mary alone to wonder. They received confirmation of Jesus’ holiness from the visits by the wise men and the shepherds who guarded the spotless lambs for the temple. Their visits strengthened Mary, as it says in Luke 2:19, “But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart.“
That strengthening provided the reservoir for Mary and Joseph as they fled by night to Egypt to live in exile with bounties on their heads even further from home. They waited until the appointed time to settle out of sight in backwater Nazareth. They had to wonder, would the “cup” they had been given be worth all of this?
“For outlandish creatures like us, on our way to a heart, a brain, and courage, Bethlehem is not the end of our journey but only the beginning - not home but the place through which we must pass if ever we are to reach home at last.”
Frederick Buechner, The Magnificent Defeat
This Advent reminds us that we must prepare ourselves for the coming of the Son of God. But that preparation is in our hearts. It’s stepping outside of ourselves to look objectively at our “cup” and to see God coming to us repeatedly with opportunities to strengthen our hope, like Mary and Joseph.
Mary and Joseph could have easily chosen not to believe what they were seeing. We can do that too. We can let life get us down and beg God to take our cup from us. In our woe, we can fail to see how God is reaching out with bucketloads of grace to strengthen us and instill hope.
Like Mary, let us take a journey during this advent to treasure in our hearts how God has provided hope in unexpected ways this year. Who are your equivalent of the wise men and the shepherds who comfort you by confirming the best in you? What gives you hope that you can make it through another day?
There have been times as a minister when I have questioned if I could remain hopeful in faith. I wondered if it had all been a waste of time. I wondered if Christianity was too far gone to extremism and drunken power. I wondered if I was actually a failure when the agony of my church closing arrived. But I am still here, hopeful that God will be true and that everything served a purpose.
I want you to know that you’re not alone with whatever cup you carry this Advent. You have so much to offer this world, no matter what your life may be like today. You are worthy in God’s eyes, and your life has meaning; because of that, you can hope for a better tomorrow. Yes, God will make clear why your journey is worth enduring when you are ready to receive it.
Jesus could see his Father loved him even though that task ahead would be the hardest thing any son would endure. He trusted the plan his Father had set before him and, in doing so, provides the model for us this Advent. Will you trust God to use you this Advent season? Will you open yourself to being a vessel of God to be a blessing to those around you and who God brings into your life? My prayer is that you are strengthened to say yes during Advent.
O come, all ye faithful, joyful and triumphant!
O come ye, O come ye to Bethlehem
Come and behold HimO come, let us adore Him
Christ the Lord!