“Signs of His Nearness”
Philippians 4:4-7
Beloved, in this season when we celebrate Jesus’ coming into the world, we have
spoken since the first Sunday in Advent of a stubborn hope, a hope that followers of Christ must claim, even
when there appears to be no grounds for hope in our ordinary lives. We have been careful to say then and now that we are
not to be exempted from the most heinous of trials and set-backs; rather, right
in the face of peril, we must keep on rebelliously affirming that the
misery that we know now will not last.
Advent hope should not come easy.
It should not be painless. On the
road to “hope against hope”, we ought be tested, especially by the enemy of
hope, the Devil himself!
Maybe before today, we were tempted
to consider these words merely thoughtful and cleaver rhetoric, however the vile and
tragic slaughter of the 20 innocent children in Connecticut offers us a
specific, unavoidable, living example of how hoping against hope is not a cliché. When we say hoping against hope, we
mean even when we are confronted
with the starkest, most brutal, seemingly insurmountable expression of evil, we
will dare to shout out with deep conviction and feeling, godliness
will ultimately prevail!
Right in the middle of
Advent, an atrocity threatens our hope. Already, there are reports that some
people in Newtown are removing their Christmas decorations! The spirit of the
Devil is at work, determined to stamp out the hope that is inherent in this season,
but we must believe we are not powerless in this situation.
Indeed, if we are to rely solely on our
own resources, we will be crushed by the weight and bewilderment of it all. But I am reminded of these words from 2
Corinthians 12:9: “My grace is sufficient for you, for my
power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly
about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.”
When we are weak, when we
are broken, when we are lost for words to say, His power strengthens us to live
for another day. When we feel the
most insecure, the most unraveled, the most discombobulated, it is the gospel
of the Lord Jesus Christ that fills us with a new resolve not to be defeated by
the evil in our midst. It is the
strength of Christ that empowers us to have compassion, not only for the
precious victims, but for the lost and troubled soul who perpetrated this
dastardly act.
Adam Lanza is not a
monster, as the news media will characterize him---no more than those of us who
lack the will to act to uproot the culture of violence that leaves us mourning
now, and will cause us to mourn in the future. No, Adam, a young man whom I
obviously did not know personally, is a product of a broken and confused spirit
that was induced by a world which he experienced as uncaring and
un-nurturing. It is unlikely that
we will ever know his conscious motive, but we know he is not alone---as we
recall even the most recent merciless rampages in places like Colorado and
Virginia Tech and Fort Hood.
Everyday, in the dark corners of our economically marginalized cities,
children meet an early and senseless death almost
without notice. So something is seriously wrong.
Without excusing
individuals for their actions, let us acknowledge to ourselves that something
is wrong with a culture that keeps spewing out these cold blooded assaults on
unsuspecting crowds. We must acknowledge there is something wrong with a
culture that incarcerates so many of its people; what is wrong with a culture that is still so encapsulated
by what Dr. King called “the giants triplets”---racism, poverty and violence.
He reminded us that our destinies are intertwined, that we are part of "a single garment of destiny". This is why we share the grief and outrage for the people
in Newtown, and whenever some event of this magnitude takes place.
I declare my support for the appropriate federal laws regulating guns and ammunition. And as difficult as it may prove to be to realize these goals, even after this horrific massacre, I believe the more difficult challenge is to win King's prescription for our ailment, which he called a "Revolution of Values". Without such a revolution that will turn the American culture of violence on its head, we can regulate guns, but our national sickness will remain.
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