I'm sitting on the couch in my office thinking about the Lego Pirate Advent Calendar I saw the other day on Amazon.com. It is a beautiful morning. The sun is shining through my window. It's in the fifties outside. The coffee table in front of me is adorned with roses left over from Gurda's memorial service on Monday. Oh, and there is actual coffee on the coffee table. And it's good. Mexican. Muy bueno.
I'm feeling melancholy. It is two hours and eight minutes until I teach the final class of Women's Bible Study for this semester. We have studied Revelation. I am not ready for it to be over. The book, combined with the women's input and thirst for God, has renewed my faith.
But I can't get that Lego Pirate Advent Calendar out of my head. It's bothering me. Goofy calendar. That calendar deserves a Slim Pickens-esque comment like the one from Dr. Strangelove when Major T. J. "King" Kong says: "Now I've been to one world fair, a picnic, and a rodeo, and that's the stupidest thing I've heard come over a set of earphones." (By the way, as a sidenote, Slim Pickens is the greatest southern-drawl actor of all time. We could debate this point if you'd like. But you'd be wrong.)
Okay, back to the Lego Pirate Advent Calendar.
I was talking about the calendar to my new friend Mary the other night at a small group dinner. It was not until that conversation that I realized the difference between secular and Christian Advent calendars. You see, I did not grow up with Advent calendars. Mary did. So I gained from her experience.
Evidently, most Advent calendars begin today, December 1st. Whether Legos or pieces of chocolate, most of them last twenty-five days counting down 'til Christmas.
But for serious Christian traditions--(from what I understand; again, I'm new at this)--today is technically the fourth day of Advent. Today is the fourth day of the discipline of thinking about how we as followers of Jesus are stuck in the middle. Jesus has come; Jesus will come again. But for now, we live in what J. Paul Sampley calls, "the already, but not yet." Or the other way Sampley puts it, we are living "between the times."
So today, on this fourth day of Advent--(not the first day, to all you chocolate-eating-lego-playing-pagans in bloggerland)--we once again anticipate the fulfillment of Jesus' promise to come back and finish what he started.
But in the meantime, we will read and share the joyful promises of books like Revelation that encourage us to keep on keepin' on, to keep enduring, to keep practicing faithfulness. (And I mean "practice" literally; most of us are not very good at it yet.)
Keep practicing faithfulness.
Keep practicing.
From Revelation 7 (also reprised in chapter 21):
"Never again will they hunger;
never again will they thirst.
The sun will not beat down on them,
nor any scorching heat.
For the Lamb at the center of the throne
will be their shepherd;
he will lead them to springs of living water.
And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes."
This first week of Advent is all about hope.
One of these days, God himself will take the sleeve of his garment like a tender mother and wipe away every single tear. And that will be it.
That will be it.
No more tears.
But for now, we wait.
