Waiting for Jesus is Getting Harder

A Presbyterian Leader Blogpost by Tom M. Trinidad, Vice-Moderator, 220^th General Assembly

I think I might have passed another mid-life milestone. For the past few years Advent has grown in significance for me. It started with an insight while reading Karl Barth, of all people, that we are an Advent people—ironic because Barth wasn’t much for liturgy and the liturgical year.

But Barth’s steady reminder that we are a people determined by Christ’s advent, a people suspended between Christ’s incarnation and our consummation to come, transformed the way I looked at the whole year, but especially Advent-Christmas. I began to “celebrate,” not just “observe” Advent. Then Christmas was delivered from cynicism to anamnesis—hope grounded in remembering.

But this year a new realization is dawning. I’m tired of waiting. I could attribute it to fatigue generally; a product of my dual role as pastor and vice-moderator. Perhaps I’ve grown weary of arguing for Advent as the solution to the misunderstood so-called “war on Christmas.” Or, as I’ll readily admit, it is getting increasingly difficult to be creative with the liturgies this time of year.

But the real issue, I think, is not so much that within myself I am wearing down, but that there are more things doing the wearing down in my life. This week a beloved aging relative fell inexplicably for the first time. Today I learned one of our bridesmaids, together with her husband since before we were married 15 years ago, is separated from her husband. Last week 20 elementary school children were massacred. Psalm 6 speaks to me like never before: “Be gracious to me, O Lord, for I am languishing; O Lord, heal me, for my soul also is in deep anguish, while you, O Lord—how long?”

Tonight I am leading an Advent worship service. Sunday is “Christmas Sunday,” and Monday night is obviously Christmas Eve. But before all that, I felt my congregation needed to worship deeply in the spirit of Advent. Over the past month I have spoken with more people whose futures are dangling over the fiscal cliff, who are facing the holidays for the first time without their parents or their spouses, whose hearts break over the bittersweet reality that their children and grandchildren will be with us Sunday and Monday, but not again until Resurrection Sunday.

I’m tired of all this. I want it to end. Marana tha, Lord Jesus! What are you waiting for? I’ve concluded that I’m crossing another threshold of midlife. I’m old enough for parents to fear death, for friends to get divorced, and to empathize with the trials and tribulations of an ever-deepening pool of humanity.

I find myself in solidarity with the history of the world and our salvation narrative. Of the two poles between which we are suspended—Christ’s first advent and his second—I am affectionately drawn to his second. And it is this that gives me hope and will allow me to preach come Sunday morning and Monday night, that, in the words of Romans 13:11-12, “it is now the moment for us to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we became believers; the night is far gone, the day is near.”

“Far gone”? It sure doesn’t seem like it. But the longer it lasts, the closer our next “day is near.” Herein is hope. My prayer is this: that as is the case this year, may our lighting of the fourth Advent candle be brief. Amen.